Tōku aredo kimi ni zo kōru tamahoko no satobito mina ni are koime yamo

遠くあれど君にぞ恋ふる玉桙の
里人皆に我れ恋ひめやも

Roma-ji: Tōku aredo kimi ni zo kōru tamahoko no satobito mina ni are koime yamo
English Translation: Though you are far off,
it is you alone I love;
would I give my heart
to every man of the village
where the jeweled spear-road runs?
Meaning: Though you are far away, it is you I love. Would I ever love just anyone in the village? Never.
Commentary: Book Eleven Love Poems Ancient and Modern I 2598

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Expressing One's Feelings Directly"
A woman declares that though he is far away, it is only him she loves, and that she would never give her heart to just anyone in the village. As if to dispel his doubts, she states firmly that her love is directed at one person alone.
Whereas the poems before it speak of a man's pain of love, this poem is a woman's vow of unchanging feeling. The upper half names where her love is directed, and the lower half denies, through a rhetorical question, any love for others, giving the poem a clear structure.
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, "tōku aredo": "though far away." The line has one syllable too many and first marks the distance between the two.
Second line, "kimi ni zo kōru": "it is you I love." The particle "zo" sets off "kimi" strongly and is answered by the attributive "kouru." The sense breaks after the second line.
Third line, "tamahoko no": a pillow word normally attached to "road," here attached to "village," the place a road leads to.
Fourth line, "satobito mina ni": "every person of the village." The people of the nearby village are set against the distant "you."
Fifth line, "are koime yamo": "would I love them? Never." "Me yamo" is the conjectural "mu" in its realis form with "ya" and "mo," forming a rhetorical question, and it repeats the verb "to love" of the second line.
Source: Manyoshu
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