Ikabakari tsuyukekaruran saoshika no tsuma koikanuru Ono no kusabushi - Senzai Wakashu(English Translation & Meaning)

いかばかり露けかるらんさを鹿の
妻恋ひかぬる小野の草臥し

Roma-ji: Ikabakari tsuyukekaruran saoshika no tsuma koikanuru Ono no kusabushi
English Translation: How drenched with dew
it must be, I wonder:
where the stag lies,
longing for its mate in vain,
its grassy bed on Ono's moor
Meaning: How drenched with dew it must be, the grassy bed on the moor of Ono where the stag lies, longing for its mate in vain.
Commentary: Book Five Autumn Poems II 324

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Composed as a poem on the deer"
Composed as a poem on the deer. How wet with dew must be the grassy bed on the moor of Ono, the poet says, where the stag lies, yearning for its mate yet unable to reach her. Overlaying the deer's tears on the dew of the grass, he imagines the deer's plight.
The author, "Chōkaku Hōshi," was a monk of the cloistered-rule period, but little is known of his life.
This is the eighth of a run of nine poems, 317 through 325, composed as "poems on the deer."

First line, "ikabakari": "how much," imagining the degree.
Second line, "tsuyukekaruran": "tsuyukeshi" means wet with dew, and also wet with tears. "Ran" is the present conjecture, and the poem pauses here, inverted with the lines that follow. Where 318 of this book sang of dew carried with the deer's voice, this poem sings of dew on the deer's bed.
Third line, "saoshika no": "saoshika" means a stag.
Fourth line, "tsuma koikanuru": "koikanu" is to yearn without fulfilling one's love, a deer seeking its mate as in 307, 308 and 317 of this book.
Fifth line, "Ono no kusabushi": the poem ends on a noun. "Kusabushi" is lying in the grass to sleep, or the place itself, the deer's bed set against the human "toko" of 310 of this book.
Author: Chōkaku
Source: Senzai Wakashu
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