Mayone kaki shita ibukashimi omoerishi imo ga sugata o kyō mitsuru kamo

眉根掻き下いふかしみ思へりし
妹が姿を今日見つるかも

Roma-ji: Mayone kaki shita ibukashimi omoerishi imo ga sugata o kyō mitsuru kamo
English Translation: Scratching my eyebrows,
wondering deep in my heart,
I had thought of her,
and the figure of my girl
I have seen this very day
Meaning: Scratching my eyebrows, I had wondered about her in my heart, and today at last I have seen my beloved's form.
Commentary: Book Eleven Love Poems Ancient and Modern I 2614

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Expressing One's Feelings Directly"
Scratching his eyebrows, he had wondered in his heart how his beloved was, and today at last he has seen her: this is a love poem of joy. Itching eyebrows were held to be a sign of meeting the person one longs for, and the word "today" marks clearly the joy of the omen fulfilled.
This poem is a variant recorded in the left note to poem 2614 under the words "a poem in one book." Its first two lines are the same as the main poem, but the third line, "omoerishi," modifies "imo" in the fourth, and the closing lines read "imo ga sugata o kyō mitsuru kamo." Like the variant from "a certain book," it calls the beloved "imo" in place of the main poem's "inishiehito," and so speaks in a man's voice.
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, "mayone kaki": "scratching my eyebrows." Itching eyebrows were thought to herald a meeting with a loved one, and the poem opens with the same line as the main poem.
Second line, "shita ibukashimi": "wondering in my heart." "Shita" means the inner heart, and "ibukashimi" is the stem of the adjective "ibukashi" with the suffix "mi"; this line is the same as in the main poem.
Third line, "omoerishi": "of whom I had thought." "Ri" is the continuative auxiliary and "shi" the attributive form of the past auxiliary "ki," modifying "imo" in the fourth line. Unlike the main poem's "omoeru ni," it runs on into the next line as a modifier.
Fourth line, "imo ga sugata o": "the figure of my beloved." It refers to the very form of the lover he had kept in his heart.
Fifth line, "kyō mitsuru kamo": "I have seen today." "Tsuru" is the attributive form of the perfective auxiliary "tsu," and the exclamatory particle "kamo" conveys his joy that the longed-for day has come today.
Source: Manyoshu
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