Shiranami no kiyosuru shima no ariso ni mo aramashi mono o koitsutsu arazu wa

白波の来寄する島の荒礒にも
あらましものを恋ひつつあらずは

Roma-ji: Shiranami no kiyosuru shima no ariso ni mo aramashi mono o koitsutsu arazu wa
English Translation: Where the white waves break,
on an island rocky shore
would that I had been,
rather than to go on so,
longing for you without end
Meaning: I wish I had been a rocky shore on an island where the white waves break, rather than go on longing like this.
Commentary: Book Eleven Love Poems Ancient and Modern I 2733

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Expressing Feelings through Things"
Rather than go on suffering in love like this, the speaker wishes to have been the rugged shore of an island where white waves break. By longing to be a heartless rocky shore, the poem shows how deep the pain of loving as a human being is.
As a poem expressing feelings through things, it speaks through the rocky shore of an island. The pattern of "koitsutsu arazu wa," wishing to be something else rather than go on longing, is the same as in Empress Iwanohime's poem 86 in Book Two, "Rather than go on longing so, I would lie with a high mountain's rocky roots for my pillow and die." The next poem too wishes to become fine sand floating in the foam, so two poems on the wish to become something other than human are placed 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, "shiranami no": "of the white waves."
Second line, "kiyosuru shima no": "of the island where they break." It pictures an island on which white waves dash without end.
Third line, "ariso ni mo": "even a rocky shore." "Ariso" is a rough coast strewn with rocks, and the particle "mo" conveys "at least something like that."
Fourth line, "aramashi mono o": "would that I had been." "Mashi" is the auxiliary of counterfactual supposition, and "mono o" a concessive particle full of feeling; the poem breaks here.
Fifth line, "koitsutsu arazu wa": "rather than go on longing." "Tsutsu" marks continuation and "zu wa" means "rather than," inverted with the fourth line.
Source: Manyoshu
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