Tou ya tote sugi naki yado ni kinikeredo koishiki koto zo shirube narikeru - Gosen Wakashu(English Translation & Meaning)

訪ふやとて杉なき宿に来にけれど
恋しきことぞしるべなりける

Roma-ji: Tou ya tote sugi naki yado ni kinikeredo koishiki koto zo shirube narikeru
English Translation: Thinking you might ask
whether I would come, I found
your house with no cedar,
and it was my longing alone
that served to guide my way
Meaning: Thinking you might be waiting for me to call, I came to your house, though no cedar marked the gate; it was my longing alone that guided me there.
Commentary: Book Fourteen Love Poems VI 1007

Headnote: "Topic unknown."
The poet says that, thinking the beloved might be waiting for a visit, he came to a house with no cedar to mark it, and it was his longing that guided him. Drawing on an old poem that tells a visitor to look for the cedar of Miwa, he says that even with no landmark he found the way, led by longing.
The poem draws on an anonymous poem in the Miscellaneous section of the Kokinshu, "waga io wa miwa no yamamoto koishiku wa toburai kimase sugi tateru kado." The same word "shirube," guide, appears in 1021 in this book, where years of yearning are what guide the heart.
The poet is listed as anonymous, and the composer's name has not come down to us.

The first line, "Tou ya tote," means "thinking you might wish me to visit," with "tote" meaning "thinking that."
The second line, "sugi naki yado ni," means "to a house with no cedar," drawing on the old poem of the gate with a cedar at the foot of Mount Miwa.
The third line, "kinikeredo," means "I have come, yet," with "do" an adversative conjunctive particle.
The fourth line, "koishiki koto zo," means "it was my longing," with "zo" an emphatic binding particle.
The last line, "shirube narikeru," means "that was my guide," closing the "zo" of the fourth line with the attributive "keru." It uses the same word as "shirube nite" in the third line of 1021 in this book.
Author: Unknown Poet
Source: Gosen Wakashu
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