Wagimoko ga hitai ni ouru sugoroku no kotoi no ushi no kura no ue no kasa

我妹子が額に生ふる双六の
ことひの牛の鞍の上の瘡

Roma-ji: Wagimoko ga hitai ni ouru sugoroku no kotoi no ushi no kura no ue no kasa
English Translation: On my darling's brow
there grows a sugoroku
of the great bull ox,
of the saddle, of the top,
a scabby little sore.
Meaning: On my darling's forehead grows a sugoroku board's great ox's saddle-top's scab.
Commentary: Book Sixteen Poems with Tales of Origin and Miscellaneous Poems 3838

Headnote: "Two poems with no meaning at all."
Stringing together unrelated words—his darling's forehead, a sugoroku board, a great ox, a saddle, a sore—the poet makes a poem deliberately devoid of sense. In this game of crafting nonsense, the pleasure lies in the very oddity of the chain of words.
According to the left note, Prince Toneri told those attending him that he would reward with coin and cloth anyone who could make a poem with no meaning at all. The palace attendant Abe no Asomi Kooji then composed and presented this poem, and was at once given the promised reward of two thousand coins.
Abe no Kooji was a palace attendant bearing the title Asomi; little else is known of him.

First line, "wagimoko ga," means "my darling's," disguising the poem as an ordinary love song.
Second line, "hitai ni ouru," means "growing on her forehead," already beginning to break the love-poem flow.
Third line, "sugoroku no," means "of sugoroku," a board game, a word with no connection to what came before.
Fourth line, "kotoi no ushi no," means "of the great bull ox."
Final line, "kura no ue no kasa," means "the sore on the saddle." Hypermetric and ending on a noun, it closes still making no sense. The device is that every line links by no yet the whole says nothing.
Author: Abe no Kooji
Source: Manyoshu
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