Wagimoko ni kōre ni ka aramu oki ni sumu kamo no ukine no yasukeku mo nashi

我妹子に恋ふれにかあらむ沖に棲む
鴨の浮寝の安けくもなし

Roma-ji: Wagimoko ni kōre ni ka aramu oki ni sumu kamo no ukine no yasukeku mo nashi
English Translation: Is it that I love
my darling girl so deeply?
Like the ducks that dwell
far offshore and float in sleep,
I find no rest, no peace at all
Meaning: Is it because I love my darling so? Like the ducks that live far offshore and sleep afloat on the waves, I have no peace at all.
Commentary: Book Eleven Love Poems Ancient and Modern I 2806

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Expressing Feelings through Things"
Perhaps because he is in love, the speaker finds no peace, like the ducks that live far offshore and sleep floating on the waves; this is a man's poem. In the image of ducks rocked asleep among the waves he sees himself, his heart shaken by love and unable to rest.
This is one of the sequence set upon birds, following the crane of the preceding poem with the duck, a water bird. "Ukine," sleeping afloat on the water, became a word in later waka for restless, uneasy sleep.
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, "wagimoko ni": "for my darling." "Wagimoko" is a man's affectionate word for his love or wife, showing that this is a man's poem.
Second line, "kōre ni ka aramu": "is it because I love?" The particle "ka" is answered by the conjectural "mu" in its attributive form, a kakari-musubi construction, and a pause falls after the second line. The speaker asks himself why his heart will not rest.
Third line, "oki ni sumu": "that dwell offshore," modifying "kamo," the ducks. It calls up the open water far out where no one can approach.
Fourth line, "kamo no ukine no": "of the ducks sleeping afloat." The third and fourth lines form a preface, the unsteadiness of the ducks' floating sleep leading into "yasukeku mo nashi."
Fifth line, "yasukeku mo nashi": "there is no ease." "Yasukeku" is the nominalized form of the adjective "yasushi," meaning a state of peace, and the particle "mo" stresses that not the least peace is to be had.
Source: Manyoshu
Prev Poem: Ise no umi yu nakikuru tazu no otodoro mo kimi ga kikosaba are koime ya mo
Next Poem: Akenu beku chidori shiba naku shirotae no kimi ga tamakura imada akanaku ni