Tsurakaranu naka ni aru koso utoshi to ie hedatehateteshi kinu ni ya wa aranu - Gosen Wakashu(English Translation & Meaning)

つらからぬ中にあるこそ疎しといへ
隔てはててし衣にやはあらぬ

Roma-ji: Tsurakaranu naka ni aru koso utoshi to ie hedatehateteshi kinu ni ya wa aranu
English Translation: Only in a bond
that has not grown cold can one
call a thing distant—
is this robe not one
of a love long set apart
Meaning: Only between two whose bond has not grown cold could one speak of feeling distant. Is this robe not one for a pair already wholly set apart?
Commentary: Book Eleven Love Poems III 734

Headnote: "When she had made a set of clothes and sent them to a man who had begun to drift away, and he said that this somehow made him feel distant."
The poet says that one may speak of feeling distant only in a bond that is still warm, and asks whether this robe is not the robe of two already set apart. To the man who said that receiving clothes made him feel estranged, she retorts that it is he who has distanced his heart.
According to the headnote, she made clothes and sent them to a man whose visits had grown rare, and he replied that it made him feel as though they were strangers, so she composed this poem.
The poet, listed as "Ono no Tōoki ga musume," was a daughter of Ono no Tōoki, and little is known of her life.

The first line, "Tsurakaranu," means "not cold, not unkind."
The second line, "naka ni aru koso," means "only in a bond," "naka" meaning the relationship between lovers. "Koso" is an emphatic particle.
The third line, "utoshi to ie," means "can one say distant," closing with the perfective "ie" in answer to "koso" in the second line, a kakarimusubi pattern. It takes up his words, "utoki kokochi."
The fourth line, "hedatehateteshi," means "wholly set apart," drawing on how a robe stands between bodies.
The last line, "kinu ni ya wa aranu," means "is it not such a robe," with "ya wa" a rhetorical question.
Author: Daughter of Ono no Tōoki
Source: Gosen Wakashu
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