Iyukiai no saka no fumoto ni sakiwooru sakura no hana o misemu ko mo ga mo

い行き逢ひの坂のふもとに咲きををる
桜の花を見せむ子もがも

Roma-ji: Iyukiai no saka no fumoto ni sakiwooru sakura no hana o misemu ko mo ga mo
English Translation: At the foot of the slope
where travelers go and meet,
bending with their bloom,
the blossoms of the cherry here,
would I had a girl to show!
Meaning: Would that I had a girl to show these cherry blossoms, blooming so thick that the branches bend, at the foot of the slope where travelers meet.
Commentary: Book Nine Miscellaneous Poems 1752

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "A poem from the time of returning the day after spending a night at Naniwa, with tanka"; envoy
Seeing the cherries blooming so thickly that their branches bend at the foot of the slope, the speaker wishes he had a girl to show them to. The incompleteness of seeing beauty alone becomes longing for someone to share it with.
This is the envoy to the long poem 1751 in this book. The long poem sees that in a single night the cherry blossoms of Mount Tatsuta, crossed only yesterday, have fallen and are floating down the rapids, and resolves to hold a wind festival at the god's grove so that no mountain gust will blow until the lord can see them. Some link it to Emperor Shōmu's progress to Naniwa in the third month of the sixth year of Tenpyō (734).
The author, Takahashi no Mushimaro, was a poet of the early Nara period who is thought to have served under Fujiwara no Umakai when Umakai was governor of Hitachi. He excelled at long poems on local legends and the landscape of the eastern provinces. This poem is taken from the Mushimaro Collection, which is thought to consist mainly of his own works.

The first line, "at the foot of the slope," includes the prefix i in iyukiai; it is thought to be the border slope where travelers from Yamato and Kawachi meet.
The second line, "where travelers go and meet," places the scene at the foot of that slope.
The third line, "bending with their bloom," uses the verb wooru, which also appears in the long poem 1747 in this book, a word shared by the poems on the Tatsuta cherries.
The fourth line, "the blossoms of the cherry here," points to the cherries in full bloom.
The final line, "would I had a girl to show," uses the desiderative mogamo.
Author: Takahashi no Mushimaro (from the Mushimaro Collection)
Source: Manyoshu
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