Furusato ni kyō kozariseba hototogisu tare ka mukashi o koite nakamashi - Senzai Wakashu(English Translation & Meaning)

故郷に今日来ざりせば郭公
誰か昔を恋ひて鳴かまし

Roma-ji: Furusato ni kyō kozariseba hototogisu tare ka mukashi o koite nakamashi
English Translation: Had you not come here
to this place of old today,
O cuckoo,
who would there have been to cry
in longing for the past?
Meaning: Cuckoo, had you not come today to this place of old memories, who would there have been to cry out in longing for the past?
Commentary: Book Nine Poems of Lament 588

Headnote: "When a cuckoo sang at Hōkongōin after Taikenmon'in passed away"
Composed when a cuckoo sang at Hōkongōin, a temple associated with his late mother, Taikenmon'in. Cuckoo, had you not come today to this place of old, he says, who would cry out longing for the past? In the voice of the cuckoo, said to cry in longing for the past, he hears his own heart weeping for his mother, and takes comfort that there is another who longs for former days. Hōkongōin was a temple restored by Taikenmon'in.
The author, "the later Lay Prince-Abbot of Ninnaji (Kakushō)," was the fifth son of Emperor Toba, and his mother was Taikenmon'in Shōshi. He entered Ninnaji, became its head abbot, and excelled at waka.
A Kokin Wakashū poem by Mibu no Tadamine asks whether the cuckoo still longs for the past, since it comes to sing only at old familiar places, and this poem draws on that idea of a cuckoo longing for former days. The cuckoo also appears in 555 and 582 of this book.
The fourth line of this text reads "tare ka mukashi o," which does not agree with "tare to mukashi o" in the reading line. Here the text is followed.

First line, "furusato ni": "furusato" is a place of old associations, here Hōkongōin, linked with Taikenmon'in.
Second line, "kyō kozariseba": "zari" is the continuative of the negative "zu," "se" the irrealis of the past "ki," and with "ba" it forms a hypothetical, "had you not come today." It is a counterfactual answering "mashi" in the last line.
Third line, "hototogisu": an address, and the poem pauses here. The cuckoo also appears in 555 and 582 of this book.
Fourth line, "tare ka mukashi o": the interrogative "ka" closes with the attributive "mashi" in the last line.
Fifth line, "koite nakamashi": the counterfactual "mashi," "who would cry?" The cuckoo's "singing" is overlaid with the poet's own "weeping."
Author: Prince-Priest Kakushō
Source: Senzai Wakashu
Prev Poem: Shiishiba no tsuyukeki sode wa tanabata mo kasanu ni tsukete aware to ya min
Next Poem: Tsune ni mishi kimi ga miyuki o kyō toeba kaeranu tabi to kiku zo kanashiki