Saho no uchi yu arashi no kaze no fukinureba kaeri wa shirani nageku yo zo ōki

佐保の内ゆあらしの風の吹きぬれば
帰りは知らに嘆く夜ぞ多き

Roma-ji: Saho no uchi yu arashi no kaze no fukinureba kaeri wa shirani nageku yo zo ōki
English Translation: From within Saho
the stormy winds come blowing
and when they blow so,
not knowing of the return,
many are the nights I grieve
Meaning: When the storm wind blows from within Saho, I do not know of your return, and many are the nights I spend in grief.
Commentary: Book Eleven Love Poems Ancient and Modern I 2677

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Expressing Feelings through Things"
On nights when a fierce storm wind blows from within the village of Saho, the speaker, understood to be a woman, spends many hours grieving, not knowing when her lover will return. The sound of the wind on a wild night stirs the anxiety and loneliness of one who waits.
After the poems on clouds, a run of poems on wind begins here. The word "arashi" (storm wind) appears again two poems later in poem 2679, which shares the idea of thinking of a lover on a stormy night. The original script of the fourth line, "還者胡粉," is thought to use "gofun," a white pigment, to stand for "shira," but the reading and meaning of the line are disputed.
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, "Saho no uchi yu": "from within Saho." Saho lies northeast of the Nara capital along the Saho River, and the particle "yu" marks the starting point.
Second line, "arashi no kaze no": "the storm wind." It is the fierce wind that blows down from the hills.
Third line, "fukinureba": "since it blows." The realis form of the perfective "nu" with "ba" expresses cause or a recurring condition.
Fourth line, "kaeri wa shirani": "not knowing of the return." "Shirani" uses the old continuative negative "ni," conveying the helplessness of a stormy night with nothing foreseeable.
Fifth line, "nageku yo zo ōki": "many are the nights I grieve." The particle "zo" is answered by the attributive "ōki" of the adjective "ōshi" in a kakarimusubi that stresses the many nights of grief.
Source: Manyoshu
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