Kamitsuke no maguwashi mato ni asahi sashi makirawashi mo na aritsutsu mireba

上つ毛野まぐはしまとに朝日さし
まきらはしもなありつつ見れば

Roma-ji: Kamitsuke no maguwashi mato ni asahi sashi makirawashi mo na aritsutsu mireba
English Translation: In Kamitsuke,
upon lovely Maguwashi
the morning sun shines:
how dazzling you are to me
when I gaze on and on.
Meaning: Like the morning sun shining on Maguwashimato in Kamitsuke, how dazzling you are when I keep gazing at you.
Commentary: Book Fourteen Azuma Poems 3407

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Sōmon (Love Exchanges)"
Drawing on a scene lit by the morning sun, the singer says that face to face with his beloved he is too dazzled to look straight at her. The shining morning light is laid over her beauty and his own shyness.
It is one of the Kōzuke poems. "Maguwashi mato" is variously explained as a place name or as "a beautiful target," with no settled view.
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, "kamitsuke no": The old name of Kōzuke, opening, like the preceding poem, as a Kōzuke song.
Second line, "maguwashi mato ni": An obscure phrase, read as a place name or as "a lovely target."
Third line, "asahi sashi": The morning sun shining; the first three lines form a preface leading to "makirawashi."
Fourth line, "makirawashi mo na": "Makirawashi" means dazzling, and "mo na" is exclamatory. The poem pauses here.
Final line, "aritsutsu mireba": "Aritsutsu" means continuing just so; the inversion shows him gazing on and on.
Source: Manyoshu
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