Ika ni sen Muro no Yashima ni yado mogana koi no keburi o sora ni magaen - Senzai Wakashu(English Translation & Meaning)

いかにせん室の八島に宿もがな
恋の煙を空にまがへん

Roma-ji: Ika ni sen Muro no Yashima ni yado mogana koi no keburi o sora ni magaen
English Translation: What am I to do?
Would I had a dwelling at
Muro no Yashima,
that I might blend the smoke of love
with the smoke drifting through the sky
Meaning: What am I to do? If only I had a house at Muro no Yashima, where smoke is always rising, I could let the smoke of my burning love vanish into the sky among the rest.
Commentary: Book Eleven Love Poems I 703

Headnote: "On hidden love"
Composed on the topic "Hidden love." What am I to do, he says; would I had a house at Muro no Yashima, that I might blend the smoke of love into the sky. Muro no Yashima is a famed place in Shimotsuke where smoke was said to rise without end. Since there is no hiding the smoke that rises from the "fire" of love, he says that if he lived at Muro no Yashima, where the smoke never ceases, he could blend his own into it and remain unknown, expressing the pain of hidden love through a striking conceit.
The author, "Shunzei, Master of the Empress Dowager's Household," was the son of Provisional Middle Counselor Fujiwara no Toshitada. He served as Master of the Empress Dowager's Household, later took the tonsure under the name Shakua, and compiled this anthology at the command of Retired Emperor Go-Shirakawa.
This poem closes the first book of love. Where 641 at the head of the book wished to love "at least risen to the surface," like the jewel-oak buried in seaweed, this final poem seeks to hide the smoke of love by blending it into the sky, so that the opening and close of the book form a pair, a love that would show itself and a love that would hide. Its first line, "ika ni sen," is the same as in 646, 668 and 691 of this book, and it shares with "sukumo taku hi no shitakogare" in 665 the giving of love to fire and smoke.

First line, "ika ni sen": "what am I to do?" The poem pauses here. Poems 646, 668 and 691 open with the same line.
Second line, "Muro no Yashima ni": Muro no Yashima is a famed place in Shimotsuke, sung of as a place where smoke always rises.
Third line, "yado mogana": "mogana" is a final particle of wish, "would I had a dwelling there." The poem pauses here.
Fourth line, "koi no keburi o": "keburi," "smoke," is the smoke rising from love likened to "fire." Like "sukumo taku hi no" in the second line of 665, it gives love to fire.
Fifth line, "sora ni magaen": "magae" is the irrealis of "magau," "to blend so as not to be distinguished," and "n" the volitional "mu," "I would blend it into the smoke of the sky."
Author: Fujiwara no Shunzei
Source: Senzai Wakashu
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