Waga seko ga yado no nadeshiko chirame ya mo iya hatsuhana ni saki wa masu tomo

我が背子が宿のなでしこ散らめやも
いや初花に咲きは増すとも

Roma-ji: Waga seko ga yado no nadeshiko chirame ya mo iya hatsuhana ni saki wa masu tomo
English Translation: At your home, my friend,
could the pinks that bloom there fall?
Never, I am sure;
rather, ever like first flowers
they will bloom more and more
Meaning: Could the pinks at your house ever fall, my friend? No, rather they will bloom ever more, fresh as first flowers.
Commentary: Book Twenty Miscellaneous Poems 4450

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "On the eighteenth day, the Minister of the Left held a banquet at the residence of the Minister of Military Affairs, Tachibana no Naramaro; three poems."
Could the pinks of your house ever fall? Rather they will bloom ever more, fresh as first flowers: a poem blessing the prosperity of the host Naramaro's house. The left note says it is the first of two poems that Ōtomo no Yakamochi, Junior Assistant Minister of Military Affairs, composed afterward. It was not presented at the banquet but written later with the banquet in mind. Its first two lines match those of Ōhara no Imaki's poem at the banquet at Yakamochi's house on the ninth of the fifth month in this book.
The author, Ōtomo no Yakamochi, son of Ōtomo no Tabito, was at this time Junior Assistant Minister of Military Affairs.

The first line, "waga seko ga," addresses a close friend, here the host Naramaro.
The second line, "yado no nadeshiko," the pinks of Naramaro's house, stand for its prosperity. It is the same as the second line of Imaki's poem.
The third line, "chirame ya mo," uses meyamo as a rhetorical question: could they fall? No. The poem pauses here.
The fourth line, "iya hatsuhana ni," "ever like first flowers," also appears in the poem Yakamochi composed at the banquet of the ninth.
The closing line, "saki wa masu tomo," "even if they bloom ever more," closes by inversion with a blessing of prosperity.
Author: Otomo no Yakamochi
Source: Manyoshu
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