classic waka stream

筑波嶺のをてもこのもに守部据ゑ
母い守れども魂ぞ会ひにける
Roma-ji

Tsukubane no otemo konomo ni moribe sue haha i moredomo tama zo ainikeru

English Translation
On Mount Tsukuba,
here and there on every slope
wardens have been set:
so my mother guards me close,
yet our souls have met and joined.
Meaning
As wardens are posted here and there on Mount Tsukuba, my mother keeps watch over me—yet our souls have already met.
Commentary
Book Fourteen Azuma Poems 3393

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Sōmon (Love Exchanges)"
As wardens are posted all over Mount Tsukuba to guard it, so a mother watches over her daughter—yet the lovers' souls have already met. The power of love that breaks through a mother's vigilance is sung with open-hearted ease.
It is one of the Hitachi poems. The pattern of a mother watching over, and hindering, her daughter's love recurs in the Azuma poems, as in 3359 from Suruga.
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, "tsukubane no": Mount Tsukuba, one of the Hitachi poems on the mountain.
Second line, "otemo konomo ni": "Here and there," the same phrase as "Ashigara no otemo konomo ni" in 3361 from Sagami.
Third line, "moribe sue": "Moribe" are wardens of mountains and the like, and "sue" means having stationed them. The first three lines form a preface leading to "mor(e)."
Fourth line, "haha i moredomo": "I" is an intensifying prefix, and "domo" is concessive.
Final line, "tama zo ainikeru": "Tama" is the soul or heart; the line closes in the attributive "keru," answering "zo."
Source
Manyoshu
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