Tsurugitachi mi ni hakisouru masurao ya koi to iu mono o shinobikanetemu

剣大刀身に佩き添ふる大夫や
恋といふものを忍びかねてむ

Roma-ji: Tsurugitachi mi ni hakisouru masurao ya koi to iu mono o shinobikanetemu
English Translation: A sword and great blade
girded close upon his side,
is a valiant man
then to find himself unable
to endure this thing called love
Meaning: Must even a valiant man, with sword and great blade girded at his side, find himself unable to endure this thing called love?
Commentary: Book Eleven Love Poems Ancient and Modern I 2635

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Expressing Feelings through Things"
The speaker, a valiant man with sword and great blade girded at his side, asks whether he must be unable to endure this thing called love, looking back on himself weakened by it. By contrasting the brave figure of a warrior bearing arms with a heart helpless before love, the poem conveys the overwhelming power of love.
This poem speaks through the sword, and with the next poem and the one after, three poems in a row include "tsurugitachi." Lamenting that one cannot bear love though a valiant man is a motif often found in the love poems of the Man'yoshu, one of the patterns for expressing the conflict between manly honor and a lover's heart.
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, "tsurugitachi": "sword and great blade," here weapons actually worn on the body, leading into "mi" (body).
Second line, "mi ni hakisouru": "girded close upon the body." "Haku" means to wear a sword at the waist, depicting a man bearing arms.
Third line, "masurao ya": "a valiant man." The particle "ya" marks a question and corresponds with "mu" in the last line.
Fourth line, "koi to iu mono o": "this thing called love," taking up love as a thing in itself and showing how formidable it is. The line is hypermetric, with eight syllables.
Fifth line, "shinobikanetemu": "will he fail to endure it?" "Shinobikanu" means to be unable to bear, and the perfective "tsu" in its form "te" is followed by the conjectural "mu" in the attributive form, completing a kakari-musubi construction with "ya."
Source: Manyoshu
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