Ashihiki no yamakazura no ko kyō yuku to ware ni tsugeseba kaeri komashi o

あしひきの山縵の子今日行くと
我れに告げせば帰り来ましを

Roma-ji: Ashihiki no yamakazura no ko kyō yuku to ware ni tsugeseba kaeri komashi o
English Translation: Ah, mountain vine,
my darling of the wild-vine name,
had you told me then
that this day you would depart,
I would have come back to you.
Meaning: My mountain-vine girl, had you only told me that today you would go away, I would have come straight back to you.
Commentary: Book Sixteen Poems with Tales of Origin and Miscellaneous Poems 3789

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Each set down his feelings in a poem; three poems."
The poet regrets that had Kazurako told him she would die that day, he would have hurried back to her. The bitterness of a young man who was not there at her death is expressed through a contrary-to-fact construction.
It is by one of the three young men, and it weaves the maiden's name, Kazurako, into the phrase "mountain-vine girl."
The poets are the three young men who courted Kazurako; their names are not recorded. Introduced as "another tale," the story is set beside the Sakurako pair, so that a tale of two suitors is matched by one of three.

First line, "ashihiki no," is a pillow word for "mountain." The next poem, 3790, opens with the same line, and the two form a pair.
Second line, "yamakazura no ko," links the name Kazurako to the mountain vine worn as a hair ornament. Just as the two earlier poems used the cherry for the maiden, here her name rests on a vine garland.
Third line, "kyō yuku to," means "that today she would go," a gentle way of speaking of departing this world.
Fourth line, "ware ni tsugeseba," means "had she told me." Se, the irrealis form of the past auxiliary ki, with ba sets up a condition contrary to fact.
Final line, "kaeri komashi o," means "I would have come back." The counterfactual mashi answers seba in the fourth line, and the closing o adds a note of regretful lament.
Source: Manyoshu
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