Koikoite koyoi bakari ya tanabata no makura ni chiri no tsumorazaruran - Senzai Wakashu(English Translation & Meaning)

恋ひ恋ひて今宵ばかりや七夕の
枕に塵の積もらざるらん

Roma-ji: Koikoite koyoi bakari ya tanabata no makura ni chiri no tsumorazaruran
English Translation: Having yearned and yearned,
is it only on this night
that on the pillow
of the Weaver Maid no dust
is left to gather there?
Meaning: After a whole year of longing, is it only tonight that no dust gathers on the Weaver Maid's pillow?
Commentary: Book Four Autumn Poems I 238

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Composed when presenting a hundred-poem sequence in the reign of Emperor Horikawa"
Like the preceding poem, this is a Tanabata poem from the Horikawa Hundred-Poem Sequence. After yearning all year long, is it only tonight that no dust gathers on the Weaver Maid's pillow? Turning around the image of dust gathering on the pillow of one who sleeps alone, the poem lets the loneliness of her long solitary nights show through the fact that only tonight, of all the year, is her pillow used.
The author, "Kawachi," was the daughter of Fujiwara no Nagasuke, Senior Assistant Minister of the Treasury. She served Princess Shunshi, daughter of Emperor Go-Sanjō and a former Ise Priestess, and was also called Former Ise Priestess's Kawachi. She was one of the poets of the Horikawa Hundred-Poem Sequence.
Where the preceding poem, 237, spoke of the lovers' vow, this one speaks of the pillow on the night of their meeting, and from it imagines a year of sleeping alone. The next poem, 239, also speaks of a pillow with "iwamakura."

First line, "koikoite": "yearning and yearning," the repeated word expressing a whole year of longing.
Second line, "koyoi bakari ya": "bakari" limits, "tonight alone." The interrogative "ya" links with "ran" in the last line.
Third line, "tanabata no": "of the Weaver Maid."
Fourth line, "makura ni chiri no": dust gathering on an unused pillow, an expression for the loneliness of sleeping alone. It shares the pillow with "iwamakura" in the next poem, 239.
Fifth line, "tsumorazaruran": "zaru" is the attributive of the negative "zu" and "ran" the attributive of present conjecture, closing with "ya": "does no dust gather tonight alone?"
Author: Kawachi
Source: Senzai Wakashu
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