Asashimo no kenaba kenubeku omoitsutsu ika ni kono yo o akashitemu kamo

朝霜の消なば消ぬべく思ひつつ
いかにこの夜を明かしてむかも

Roma-ji: Asashimo no kenaba kenubeku omoitsutsu ika ni kono yo o akashitemu kamo
English Translation: Like the morning frost,
ready, if I fade, to fade,
with such thoughts as these
how am I to pass this night
until the dawn comes at last?
Meaning: Like the morning frost, thinking of you until I feel I might fade away altogether, how am I ever to get through this night until dawn?
Commentary: Book Eleven Love Poems Ancient and Modern I 2458

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Expressing Feelings through Things"
Like morning frost melting away, the speaker is so consumed by love as almost to vanish, and wonders how to get through this long night: a love poem of lament. The morning frost that fades at the first touch of sun is laid over a heart wasting with love, and the pain of a sleepless night is poured out.
Following the poems on rain, this one speaks through frost. The feeling that love may extinguish life itself is expressed through morning frost that vanishes with the dawn, so that the lament over a night that will not end and the image of the frost echo each other.
The author is unknown; according to the left note, the poem comes from the Kakinomoto no Hitomaro Collection. That collection is thought to contain both Hitomaro's own poems and poems by others that he recorded. Kakinomoto no Hitomaro was a court poet active in the reigns of Empress Jito and Emperor Monmu, and is counted among the Thirty-Six Immortal Poets.

First line, "asashimo no": a pillow word attached to "ke" (to fade), since morning frost readily melts in the sun.
Second line, "kenaba kenubeku": "so that, if I fade, I should fade away." "Kenaba" is the irrealis of the perfective "nu" with "ba" forming a hypothetical, and "kenubeku" is "nu" with the conjectural "beshi." Repeating the same verb intensifies the sense that life itself might fade.
Third line, "omoitsutsu": "while thinking on and on." "Tsutsu" marks continuation, the brooding of love lasting through the night.
Fourth line, "ika ni kono yo o": "how, this night." The interrogative "ika ni" corresponds to "kamo" in the last line.
Fifth line, "akashitemu kamo": "how shall I pass it till dawn?" The irrealis "te" of the perfective "nu" with the conjectural "mu," followed by the questioning, exclamatory "kamo," expresses utter helplessness.
Author: Kakinomoto no Hitomaro Collection
Source: Manyoshu
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