Toribeyama omoiyaru koso kanashikere hitori ya koke no shita ni kuchinan - Senzai Wakashu(English Translation & Meaning)

鳥辺山思ひやるこそ悲しけれ
ひとりや苔の下に朽ちなん

Roma-ji: Toribeyama omoiyaru koso kanashikere hitori ya koke no shita ni kuchinan
English Translation: Mount Toribe,
when I think of it from here,
how sad it is:
will she lie there all alone
and molder under the moss?
Meaning: How sad it is to think of Mount Toribe. Will my mother lie there all alone and molder beneath the moss?
Commentary: Book Nine Poems of Lament 591

Headnote: "Composed after my mother, the Second-Rank Lady, passed away"
Composed after the death of the poet's mother, the Second-Rank Lady. How sad to think of Mount Toribe, he says; will she molder there alone beneath the moss? Thinking of his mother buried at Toribe, the place of funerals, rotting alone beneath a grave where no one comes, he grieves for her loneliness. His mother was the Kii Second-Rank Lady, Fujiwara no Chōshi, wet nurse to Emperor Go-Shirakawa, who died in 1166.
The author, "Minister of Popular Affairs Shigenori," was the son of Junior Counselor Fujiwara no Michinori, that is, Shinzei, and his mother was the Kii Second-Rank Lady, Fujiwara no Chōshi. Exiled after the Heiji Disturbance, he was pardoned, returned to the capital, and rose to Middle Counselor. He loved cherry blossoms and was called the Sakuramachi Middle Counselor.
The next poem, 592, was composed by his half-brother Fujiwara no Sadanori on the death of the same Kii Second-Rank Lady.

First line, "Toribeyama": a hill of Toribeno in Yamashiro, known as a place of cremation and burial.
Second line, "omoiyaru koso": the emphatic "koso" closes with the perfective "kere" in the third line.
Third line, "kanashikere": "how sad it is," and the poem pauses here.
Fourth line, "hitori ya koke no": the interrogative "ya" closes with the attributive "nan" in the last line. Poem 553 of this book also uses "hitori ya," thinking of the dead walking the road of death alone.
Fifth line, "shita ni kuchinan": "beneath the moss" means beneath the grave, and "na" is the irrealis of the intensive "nu" and "n" conjectural, "will she molder away?" Poem 595 of this book also closes with "koke no shita kana."
Author: Fujiwara no Shigenori
Source: Senzai Wakashu
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