多胡の嶺に寄せ綱延へて寄すれども
あにくやしづしその顔よきに
あにくやしづしその顔よきに
- Roma-ji
-
Tago no ne ni yosetsuna haete yosuredomo ani kuyashizushi sono kao yoki ni
- English Translation
-
On Tago's high peak
I have cast a hauling rope,
and though I pull it,
ah, how galling—it stays still,
all because her face is fair.
- Meaning
- I cast a hauling rope over Tago's peak and pull, yet—oh, how galling—it will not budge, all because her face is so fair.
- Commentary
-
Book Fourteen Azuma Poems 3411
Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Sōmon (Love Exchanges)"
Like trying to drag Tago's peak with a rope and finding it will not move, the singer laments a girl who will not yield however much he courts her. The frustration that the loveliest girls are the hardest to reach is sung in a comic tone.
It is one of the Kōzuke poems and, after 3403, names Tago again. The fourth line contains obscure words and has been read in many ways.
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, "tago no ne ni": The mountain of Tago, the same place as "the inner moor of Tago" in 3403.
Second line, "yosetsuna haete": "Laying out a rope to haul with."
Third line, "yosuredomo": "Though I try to pull," overlapping with wooing a girl. The first three lines form a preface.
Fourth line, "ani kuyashizushi": "Ani kuyashi" is thought to mean "ah, how galling," and "shizushi" to describe something still and unmoving; the line is obscure.
Final line, "sono kao yoki ni": "Because her face is fair," revealing through inversion, at the end, why she will not yield.
- Source
- Manyoshu
- Prev Poem
-
Ikahoro no soi no harihara nemokoro ni oku o na kane so masaka shi yokaba
- Next Poem
-
Kamitsuke no kuroho no nero no kuzuhagata kanashike kora ni iyazakari kumo