Imo ni koi inenu asake ni oshidori no koyu kaku wataru imo ga tsukai ka

妹に恋ひ寐ねぬ朝明にをし鳥の
こゆかく渡る妹が使か

Roma-ji: Imo ni koi inenu asake ni oshidori no koyu kaku wataru imo ga tsukai ka
English Translation: Longing for my love
in the dawn I could not sleep,
the mandarin ducks
pass this way and fly across;
are they messengers from her?
Meaning: In the dawn after a sleepless night of longing for my love, mandarin ducks fly across, passing this way. Could they be messengers from her?
Commentary: Book Eleven Love Poems Ancient and Modern I 2491

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Expressing Feelings through Things"
Having passed a sleepless night longing for his beloved, the speaker sees mandarin ducks flying across at dawn and wonders whether they might be messengers from her. So great is his longing that he seeks to feel her heart even in birds passing by.
Through mandarin ducks, which stay together as male and female, he speaks of his feelings for the beloved who is far away. With the crane of the preceding poem and the little grebe of the next, it forms a sequence of poems on birds.
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, "imo ni koi": "longing for my beloved." "Imo ni kou" is a frequent Man'yoshu phrase for yearning after someone.
Second line, "inenu asake ni": "at the dawn when I did not sleep." "I" means sleep, and "nu" is the attributive form of the negative "zu," telling of a night spent without sleep.
Third line, "oshidori no": "the mandarin ducks," birds whose male and female keep close company, chosen as fitting for a love poem.
Fourth line, "koyu kaku wataru": "pass this way and fly across thus." "Koyu" means "passing by here," describing the scene before his eyes just as it is.
Fifth line, "imo ga tsukai ka": "are they my beloved's messengers?" "Ka" is an interrogative particle, and the poem ends with a noun, conjecturing.
Author: Kakinomoto no Hitomaro Collection
Source: Manyoshu
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Next Poem: Omoi ni shi amari ni shikaba niodori no nazusai koshi o hito mikemu kamo