Waga omou hito wa kusaba no tsuyu nare ya kakureba sode no mazu sohotsuramu - Shui Wakashu(English Translation & Meaning)

我が思ふ人は草葉の露なれや
かくれば袖のまづそほつらむ

Roma-ji: Waga omou hito wa kusaba no tsuyu nare ya kakureba sode no mazu sohotsuramu
English Translation: Is the one I love
the dew upon the grass leaves?
For whenever she
comes to rest upon my heart,
first of all my sleeves are drenched.
Meaning: Is the one I love the dew on the grass? Whenever I set my heart on her, my sleeves are drenched before all else, as if the dew had fallen on them.
Commentary: Book Twelve Love Poems II 761

Headnote: "Topic unknown"
The poem asks whether the one the poet loves is dew on the grass, since whenever he sets his heart on her, his sleeves are first to be drenched. Pivoting "kaku" on setting one's heart on someone and dew falling on the sleeve, it likens the sleeves wet with tears each time he thinks of her to sleeves wet with dew from the grass. Following the preceding poem, 760, it sings of wet sleeves.
The final line of the main text reads "sode" with a mistaken character, but following "sode no" in the reading line it is taken as an error for "sode," sleeve, and read as such.

First line, "waga omou," means "whom I love."
Second line, "hito wa kusaba no," means "the one, of the grass leaves."
Third line, "tsuyu nare ya," means "is she the dew," with "ya" interrogative. The poem breaks after this third line.
Fourth line, "kakureba sode no," is a pivot word: "kaku" means setting one's heart on someone and dew falling on the sleeve. "Ba" after the perfective form means "whenever."
Final line, "mazu sohotsuramu," means "are first drenched, it seems," with "ramu" an auxiliary conjecturing a cause. It uses the same word "sohotsu" as the fourth line of 729 in this book, "nado te sohotsuru."
Author: Unknown Poet
Source: Shui Wakashu
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