Miyako e to omou ni tsukete kanashiki wa tare ka wa ima wa ware o matsuran - Senzai Wakashu(English Translation & Meaning)

都へと思ふにつけて悲しきは
誰かは今は我を待つらん

Roma-ji: Miyako e to omou ni tsukete kanashiki wa tare ka wa ima wa ware o matsuran
English Translation: As I think of going
to the capital, what grieves me
is this one thing:
who is there now in that place
who will be waiting for me?
Meaning: What saddens me as I think of returning to the capital is this: who is there now to wait for me? No one.
Commentary: Book Nine Poems of Lament 568

Headnote: "Composed on the road as I hurried up to the capital, having heard while I was in the provinces that my wife in the capital had died"
Composed on the road as the poet hurried up to the capital after hearing, while serving in a province, that his wife in the capital had died. What grieves me as I think of the capital, he says, is that now no one will be waiting for me. Until now returning to the capital meant the joy of seeing one who waited, but now no one will greet him, and the poem conveys the emptiness of that homeward journey.
The author, "Minamoto no Sanemoto Ason," was an official of the mid Heian period who, as the headnote suggests, served as a provincial governor, but little is known of his life.
Poem 599 of this book, conversely, is about hurrying down to a father who died in the provinces, and with "matsuramu to omowaba" it likewise sings of a journey with no one waiting.

First line, "miyako e to": "to the capital," thinking of returning.
Second line, "omou ni tsukete": "whenever I think of it."
Third line, "kanashiki wa": "what is sad," its content given in the lower verse.
Fourth line, "tare ka wa ima wa": the rhetorical "ka wa" closes with the attributive "ran" in the last line.
Fifth line, "ware o matsuran": the present conjectural "ran," "who would be waiting for me? No one." It corresponds to "matsuramu to" in the first line of 599 of this book.
Author: Minamoto no Sanemoto
Source: Senzai Wakashu
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