Naniwahito ashibi taku ya no su shite aredo ono ga tsuma koso tsune mezurashiki

難波人葦火焚く屋の煤してあれど
おのが妻こそ常めづらしき

Roma-ji: Naniwahito ashibi taku ya no su shite aredo ono ga tsuma koso tsune mezurashiki
English Translation: Though, like the houses
where the folk of Naniwa
burn reeds, she is sooty,
it is my own wife alone
who is ever dear and fresh
Meaning: Though she may be sooty, like the houses where the people of Naniwa burn reeds, my own wife is always the one I find fresh and dear.
Commentary: Book Eleven Love Poems Ancient and Modern I 2651

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Expressing Feelings through Things"
Just as the houses where the people of Naniwa burn reeds are blackened with soot, a wife may look worn after long years together, yet she is always dear: this poem sings of unchanging love for one's wife. Through the unadorned image of a sooty house, it frankly conveys affection for a long-wedded partner.
The first two lines form a preface in which the soot of houses burning reeds leads to "su shite," "grown sooty." Naniwa was known as a land thick with reeds, and the preface draws on the life of that place. Following the deer-fire two poems earlier, it is another poem on fire, so that a mountain fire and a shoreside reed fire stand close together.
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, "naniwahito": people living in Naniwa, the area of present-day Osaka, a place known for its abundant reeds.
Second line, "ashibi taku ya no": "of the houses where reed fires burn." These two lines form a preface leading to "su shite."
Third line, "su shite aredo": "though grown sooty." The blackened house is overlaid with the image of a wife worn by long years together.
Fourth line, "ono ga tsuma koso": "my own wife indeed." The binding particle "koso" singles out the wife and calls for a closing form.
Fifth line, "tsune mezurashiki": "is ever dear and fresh." "Mezurashi" means worthy of delight, fresh and lovable; here its attributive form answers the "koso," showing an archaic pattern of the binding construction.
Source: Manyoshu
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