道の辺の茨のうれに延ほ豆の
からまる君をはかれか行かむ
からまる君をはかれか行かむ
- Roma-ji
-
Michi no e no umara no ure ni haomame no karamaru kimi o hakare ka yukamu
- English Translation
-
On the brambles' tips
that grow along the roadside
the creeping beans twine;
like them you cling and hold me,
must I break away and go?
- Meaning
- Like bean vines twining around the tips of roadside brambles, you cling to me; must I break away from you and go?
- Commentary
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Book Twenty Frontier Guard Poems 4352
Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Poems of the frontier guards sent in rotation to the provinces of Tsukushi in the second month of Tenpyō Shōhō 7, year of the wood sheep."
Like bean vines twining round the bramble tips, you cling to me; must I break away and go? The poem likens the parting scene to a familiar plant. It is the sixth poem from Kazusa. Some take kimi, "you," to be the young master of the household he served, others his wife. Hakare is thought to be a dialect form of wakare.
The author, Hasetsukabe no Tori, is recorded as a regular guard from Amaha District in Kazusa; nothing more is known of him.
The first line, "michi no e no," "by the roadside," sets an everyday scene.
The second line, "umara no ure ni," uses ure, "tip," for the ends of the brambles.
The third line, "haomame no," the creeping bean; the first three lines form a preface leading to karamaru, "twining."
The fourth line, "karamaru kimi o," turns from the preface to the one clinging and refusing to let go.
The closing line, "hakare ka yukamu," uses the interrogative ka, lamenting: must I part and go? It has the same form as the close of the third Kazusa poem, "wakare ka yukamu."
- Author
- Hasetsukabe no Tori
- Source
- Manyoshu
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