Yū sareba kimi kimasamu to machishi yo no nagori zo ima mo ine kate ni suru

夕されば君来まさむと待ちし夜の
なごりぞ今も寐ねかてにする

Roma-ji: Yū sareba kimi kimasamu to machishi yo no nagori zo ima mo ine kate ni suru
English Translation: When evening comes on,
"Now he will come," so I thought,
waiting through the nights;
it lingers still, so even now
I cannot fall asleep
Meaning: Because of all the nights I waited, thinking you would come as evening fell, even now I cannot fall asleep.
Commentary: Book Eleven Love Poems Ancient and Modern I 2588

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Expressing One's Feelings Directly"
A woman laments that the habit of waiting each evening for her lover has stayed with her, so that even now, when he no longer comes, she cannot sleep. In saying that the nights of waiting have become part of her, she lets resentment and lingering attachment to the man who has stopped visiting show through.
As if answering "I cannot fall asleep" in the preceding poem, this poem too speaks of a sleepless night. The preceding poem is a man's, unable to sleep apart from his wife, while this is a woman's, unable to sleep from waiting for her man, so the grief of the one who is away and the one who waits stand side by side.
The author is unknown. The anonymous poems of Book Eleven gather love poems by people whose names have not come down to us.

First line, "yū sareba": "when evening comes." "Sareba" is the verb "saru" with "ba," expressing the arrival of that time.
Second line, "kimi kimasamu to": "thinking you would come." "Kimasu" is "ku" (to come) with the honorific "masu," and "mu" is the auxiliary of conjecture.
Third line, "machishi yo no": "of the nights I waited." The past auxiliary "shi" looks back on the days of many nights spent waiting.
Fourth line, "nagori zo ima mo": "it is the lingering trace, even now." The emphatic particle "zo" sets off "nagori" strongly and is answered by the attributive form at the end of the poem.
Fifth line, "ine kate ni suru": "I cannot fall asleep." "Kate ni" is the auxiliary "katsu," to be able, with the old negative "ni," and "suru" is the attributive ending that answers "zo" in the fourth line.
Source: Manyoshu
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