Omokata no wasuru to araba azukinaku otokojimono ya koitsutsu oramu

面形の忘るとあらばあづきなく
男じものや恋ひつつ居らむ

Roma-ji: Omokata no wasuru to araba azukinaku otokojimono ya koitsutsu oramu
English Translation: If her face and form
were things I could just forget,
would I, wretchedly,
I who am a man, go on
longing for her as I do?
Meaning: If I could only forget her face, would I, a man, go on longing for her in this sorry way?
Commentary: Book Eleven Love Poems Ancient and Modern I 2580

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Expressing One's Feelings Directly"
If he could forget her face, he, a man, would not go on longing so wretchedly: this is a man's poem. Through a rhetorical question it says that it is precisely because he cannot forget her image that he suffers from love.
It belongs to the category "Expressing One's Feelings Directly." Poem 2582, two poems later in this book, also opens with "azukinaku," sharing the same word. The motif of a man suffering from love despite being a man also connects with poem 2584.
The author is unknown. The anonymous poems of Book Eleven gather the love poems of people whose names have not come down to us.

First line, "omokata no": "her face and form." It refers to the image of the beloved.
Second line, "wasuru to araba": "if I could forget." "Araba" is the irrealis form with "ba," making a hypothetical condition.
Third line, "azukinaku": "helplessly, wretchedly." It expresses self-reproach at a love unbecoming a man, and is the same word that opens poem 2582 of this book.
Fourth line, "otokojimono ya": "I, being a man." "Jimono" means "one who is," and the particle "ya" marks a rhetorical question.
Fifth line, "koitsutsu oramu": "would I go on longing? Surely not." It closes in the attributive of the auxiliary "mu" in agreement with "ya" in the fourth line.
Source: Manyoshu
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