我が門の五本柳いつもいつも
母が恋すす業りましつしも
母が恋すす業りましつしも
- Roma-ji
-
Waga kazu no itsumoto yanagi itsumo itsumo omo ga koisusu narimashitsu shimo
- English Translation
-
By my home's gateway
five willow trees stand in a row;
ever, ever so
mother, longing all the while,
must be toiling at her work
- Meaning
- Like the five willows by the gate of my home, always, always my mother must be working in the fields, longing for me all the while.
- Commentary
-
Book Twenty Frontier Guard Poems 4386
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 the five willows by my gate, always, always my mother must be working and longing for me: the poem imagines his mother's days at home. It is the third poem from Shimōsa. Drawing on the familiar willows at the gate, it pictures a mother working on as ever while worrying over her son. Kazu for kado and omo for haha are dialect, and susu is an eastern form of tsutsu.
The author, Yahagibe no Managa, was a guard from Yūki District in Shimōsa; nothing more is known of him.
The first line, "waga kazu no," "at my gate," shows a scene of the home.
The second line, "itsumoto yanagi," five willows at the gate; the first two lines form a preface leading by the sound itsu to itsumo itsumo.
The third line, "itsumo itsumo," hypermetric, doubles "always."
The fourth line, "omo ga koisusu," means "my mother, longing all the while."
The closing line, "narimashitsu shimo," uses naru, "to work at one's living," with the honorific masu: she must be working as she thinks of me.
- Author
- Yahagibe no Managa
- Source
- Manyoshu
- Prev Poem
-
Yukosaki ni nami na toerai shirue ni wa ko o to tsuma o to okite tomo kinu
- Next Poem
-
Chiba no nu no konotegashiwa no hohomaredo aya ni kanashimi okite ta ga kinu