人知れぬ我が物思ひの涙をば
そでにつけてぞ見すべかりける
そでにつけてぞ見すべかりける
- Roma-ji
-
Hito shirenu waga monoomoi no namida oba sode ni tsukete zo misu bekarikeru
- English Translation
-
These tears I shed
in a brooding no one knows—
I should have sent them,
pinned upon my sleeve,
to show you how I weep
- Meaning
- The tears I shed in my secret brooding—I should have pinned them to my sleeve, to the messenger named Sleeve, and let you see them.
- Commentary
-
Book Eleven Love Poems III 762
Headnote: "When the other's heart had grown cold, sent by way of a messenger named Sode."
The poet says she should have let him see the tears of her secret brooding by fastening them to her sleeve. Playing on the messenger's name, Sode, "sleeve," she tries to convey the pain in her heart as if showing him a tear-soaked sleeve.
According to the headnote, the poem was sent, when the other person's heart had grown cold, by a messenger named Sode.
The poet is listed as "anonymous," and the composer's name has not come down to us.
The first line, "Hito shirenu," means "unknown to others." The first line of 731 in this book is also "hito shirenu," sharing the same line.
The second line, "waga monoomoi no," means "of my brooding," a line with an extra syllable.
The third line, "namida oba," means "these tears."
In the fourth line, "sode ni tsukete zo," "sode" is a pivot word meaning both the "sleeve" that wipes tears and the messenger's name, Sode. "Zo" is an emphatic particle.
The last line, "misu bekarikeru," means "I should have shown," closing with the attributive "keru" in answer to "zo" in the fourth line, a kakarimusubi pattern.
- Author
- Unknown Poet
- Source
- Gosen Wakashu
- Prev Poem
-
Yo to tomo ni nageki koritsumu mi ni shi areba nazo yamamori no aru kai mo naki
- Next Poem
-
Yama no ha ni kakaru omoi no taezaraba kumoi nagara mo aware to omowan