Waga tame wa itodo asaku ya narinuran nonaka no shimizu fukasa masareba - Gosen Wakashu(English Translation & Meaning)

我がためはいとど浅くやなりぬらん
野中の清水深さまされば

Roma-ji: Waga tame wa itodo asaku ya narinuran nonaka no shimizu fukasa masareba
English Translation: Toward me, I wonder,
has it grown shallower still,
since the clear spring
out in the middle of the fields
has grown so much deeper
Meaning: Has your love for me grown shallower still, I wonder, now that the spring in the middle of the fields—your first wife—has grown deeper?
Commentary: Book Eleven Love Poems III 784

Headnote: "Hearing that he was going back to live with his former wife, she sent this to the man."
The poet wonders whether his love for her has grown shallower, now that the spring in the fields has grown deeper. To a man who has returned to his former wife, she reproaches him: as the old bond deepens, has his love for her grown shallow?
According to the headnote, she heard that the man was going back to live with his former wife and sent him this poem. Drawing on the Kokin Wakashū poem "inishie no nonaka no shimizu nurukeredo moto no kokoro o shiru hito zo kumu," it takes the spring in the fields as a figure for the former wife.
The poet is listed as "anonymous," and the composer's name has not come down to us.

The first line, "Waga tame wa," means "toward me." The first line of 789 in this book is also "waga tame wa," sharing the same line.
The second line, "itodo asaku ya," means "all the shallower," with "ya" an interrogative particle.
The third line, "narinuran," means "has it become," closing with the attributive "ran" in answer to "ya" in the second line, a kakarimusubi pattern. The poem pauses here, in inverted order with the lines that follow.
The fourth line, "nonaka no shimizu," is a spring welling up in the fields, which, drawing on the Kokin Wakashū poem, stands for the former wife.
The last line, "fukasa masareba," means "since its depth has grown," setting "fukasa," depth, against "asaku," shallow, in the second line.
Author: Unknown Poet
Source: Gosen Wakashu
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