Adahito no yana uchiwatasu se o hayami kokoro wa omoedo tada ni awanu kamo

阿太人の梁打ち渡す瀬を早み
心は思へど直に逢はぬかも

Roma-ji: Adahito no yana uchiwatasu se o hayami kokoro wa omoedo tada ni awanu kamo
English Translation: Where the Ada folk
set their weirs across the stream
the rapids run fast;
though within my heart I yearn,
face to face we never meet
Meaning: As the rapids where the people of Ada set their fish weirs run too fast to cross, so though I long for you in my heart, I cannot meet you face to face.
Commentary: Book Eleven Love Poems Ancient and Modern I 2699

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Expressing Feelings through Things"
Though I love you in my heart, I cannot meet you face to face: so this poem laments. It lays the greatness of the obstacle between the two over the impossibility of crossing the swift rapids where the people of Ada set their weirs.
From this poem, poems on rivers continue, and the first three lines form a preface figuring, through the swiftness of the rapids, why they cannot meet. Ada is a place in Uchi District of Yamato, along the Yoshino River in present-day Gojo, Nara Prefecture. The people of Ada are said to have caught sweetfish and other fish in weirs on the Yoshino River.
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, "adahito no": "the people of Ada." Ada is a place on the Yoshino River, and the phrase points to the river fishers who live there.
Second line, "yana uchiwatasu": "setting their weirs across." A yana is a fish trap made by driving rows of stakes into the shallows of a river.
Third line, "se o hayami": "since the rapids are swift." The pattern "o ... mi" is the mi construction giving a reason. The first three lines are a preface, laying the uncrossable rapids over their inability to meet.
Fourth line, "kokoro wa omoedo": "though my heart longs." "Wa" singles out the heart, and the concessive "do" sets it against the next line.
Fifth line, "tada ni awanu kamo": "we do not meet face to face." "Tada ni" means directly, "nu" is the attributive of the negative "zu," and "kamo" closes with a sigh.
Source: Manyoshu
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