Machikakute tsuraki o miru wa ukeredomo uki wa mono ka wa koishiki yori wa - Gosen Wakashu(English Translation & Meaning)

間近くてつらきを見るはうけれども
うきはものかは恋しきよりは

Roma-ji: Machikakute tsuraki o miru wa ukeredomo uki wa mono ka wa koishiki yori wa
English Translation: To see your coldness
from close at hand is painful,
and yet that pain—
what is it worth at all
beside the ache of longing
Meaning: It is painful to see your coldness from so near, yet what is that pain worth beside the pain of longing for you from afar?
Commentary: Book Fourteen Love Poems VI 1045

Headnote: "Composed when someone who came to talk with him was on the whole friendly, but would not draw close."
The poet says that seeing coldness up close is painful, yet that pain is nothing compared with longing. Weighing nearness against distance, he says the pain of longing from afar outweighs the pain of being treated coldly close at hand.
According to the headnote, the one who came to talk was on the whole friendly but would not draw close. As if taking up "itodo machikaku" in the fourth line of 1041 in this book, it opens with "machikakute," close at hand.
The poet is listed as anonymous, and the composer's name has not come down to us.

The first line, "Machikakute," means "being close at hand," using the same word as "itodo machikaku" in the fourth line of 1041 in this book.
The second line, "tsuraki o miru wa," means "to see your coldness."
The third line, "ukeredomo," means "though it is painful," with "ukere" the perfective of "ushi."
The fourth line, "uki wa mono ka wa," means "what is that pain worth," with "mono ka wa" rhetorical. It repeats the "ukere" of the third line as "uki."
The last line, "koishiki yori wa," means "compared with longing," turning back to the fourth line by inversion.
Author: Unknown Poet
Source: Gosen Wakashu
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