Yoso ni nomi mite ya wataramo Naniwagata kumoi ni miyuru shima naranaku ni

よそにのみ見てや渡らも難波潟
雲居に見ゆる島ならなくに

Roma-ji: Yoso ni nomi mite ya wataramo Naniwagata kumoi ni miyuru shima naranaku ni
English Translation: Only from afar
must I watch as I go by?
Naniwa's tideflats
and yet you are no island
glimpsed beyond the far-off clouds
Meaning: Must I only watch from afar as I go by? On the tideflats of Naniwa, you are no island seen far off beyond the clouds.
Commentary: Book Twenty Frontier Guard Poems 4355

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."
Must I only watch from afar as I go by, though you are no island far beyond the clouds? The poem laments, at Naniwa, a longing he cannot fulfill. It is the ninth poem from Kazusa. What he watches from afar is read variously, as a beloved or as the splendor of the capital at Naniwa. Wataramo is a dialect form of wataramu.
The author, Hasetsukabe no Yamashiro, is recorded as a regular guard from Musa District in Kazusa; nothing more is known of him.

The first line, "yoso ni nomi," "only as something apart," shows that he can do no more than look on from a distance.
The second line, "mite ya wataramo," uses the interrogative ya: must I pass by only looking? The poem pauses here.
The third line, "Naniwagata," the tideflats of Naniwa, names where the guards assembled.
The fourth line, "kumoi ni miyuru," "seen in the far clouds," pictures a distant island.
The closing line, "shima naranaku ni," uses naku ni, negation with a sigh: though it is no faraway island.
Author: Hasetsukabe no Yamashiro
Source: Manyoshu
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