Katsushika no mama no urami o kogu fune no funabito sawaku nami tatsurashimo

葛飾の真間の浦廻を漕ぐ船の
船人騒く波立つらしも

Roma-ji: Katsushika no mama no urami o kogu fune no funabito sawaku nami tatsurashimo
English Translation: At Katsushika,
round the cove of Mama's bay
a boat rows along:
the boatmen raise up a clamor—
it seems the waves are rising.
Meaning: The boatmen rowing around the cove of Mama in Katsushika are clamoring. It seems the waves have begun to rise.
Commentary: Book Fourteen Azuma Poems 3349

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Azuma Poems"
From the shouts of boatmen rowing in the cove of Mama, the singer infers that waves have risen offshore. Catching the unseen waves through the voices that carry across the water gives the poem a vivid sense of presence.
The left note reads "The poem above is from Shimōsa Province." Mama lies near present-day Mama in Ichikawa, Chiba Prefecture, and this book also contains poems about the maiden Tekona of Mama. Following the Unakami tideflats of Kazusa in the preceding poem, the waterside poems of the Bōsō region continue.
The poet is unknown. The Azuma uta are thought to have been sung among the people of the eastern provinces, and they are marked by plain, open-hearted expression mixed with local dialect.

First line, "katsushika no": Katsushika District in Shimōsa, spanning present-day eastern Tokyo and northwestern Chiba. Poems 3384, 3385, and 3387 in this book open with the same line, so this poem heralds the group about Mama in Katsushika.
Second line, "mama no urami o": "Urami" means the winding stretch of a cove. The particle "o" marks the place through which the boat rows.
Third line, "kogu fune no": Continuing from the second line, this introduces the boatmen. Repeating the boat that rows gives concrete form to its motion.
Fourth line, "funabito sawaku": "Sawaku," once pronounced unvoiced, means to make a commotion with raised voices. Here the poem's idea of knowing a situation through sound takes shape.
Final line, "nami tatsurashimo": "Rashi" is an auxiliary of grounded conjecture: the boatmen's clamor is the evidence that waves have risen. "Mo" is an exclamatory particle. Set beside the night mooring of the preceding poem, this is a lively daytime scene in the cove.
Source: Manyoshu
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