Hikikakete namida o hito ni tsutsumu ma ni ura ya kuchinan yowa no koromo wa - Senzai Wakashu(English Translation & Meaning)

引きかけて涙を人に包む間に
裏や朽ちなん夜半の衣は

Roma-ji: Hikikakete namida o hito ni tsutsumu ma ni ura ya kuchinan yowa no koromo wa
English Translation: Drawn over my head
to hide my tears from others,
while I hide them so,
will its lining rot away,
this robe I wear at night?
Meaning: While I draw it over my head to hide my tears from others, will its lining not rot away, this robe I wear at night?
Commentary: Book Thirteen Love Poems III 814

Headnote: "Topic unknown"
Drawing my robe over my head, he says, as I hide my tears from others, will its lining not rot away, this robe of the night? So as not to let others see his tears he weeps with the bedclothes drawn over his head, and though nothing shows outside, the lining that catches his tears seems about to rot, a conceit conveying the depth of a hidden love that weeps unseen.
The author, "the Minister of the Right," is Fujiwara no Sanesada. The son of Minister of the Right Fujiwara no Kin'yoshi, he was Minister of the Right when this anthology was compiled and later rose to Minister of the Left, called the Later Tokudaiji Minister of the Left. A poem of his is included in the Ogura Hyakunin Isshu.
Poem 828 of this book sings of wetting even the lining of the sleeves after turning the robe inside out to see the beloved in a dream, answering this poem in wetting the "lining" of the robe with tears.

First line, "hikikakete": "drawing the robe over my head."
Second line, "namida o hito ni": "my tears, from others," leading into "tsutsumu" in the third line.
Third line, "tsutsumu ma ni": "tsutsumu" is to hide, "while I hide them."
Fourth line, "ura ya kuchinan": "ya" is interrogative, "na" the irrealis form of the perfective "nu," and "n" the attributive of the conjectural "mu," concluding "ya," "will the lining, not the outside, rot away?" The poem pauses here and stands in inverted order with the last line. Like "ura sae sode wa" in the fourth line of 828 of this book, it sings of tears wetting the lining of a robe.
Fifth line, "yowa no koromo wa": "yowa no koromo" is the robe worn to sleep at night, the bedclothes, the subject given last through the inversion.
Author: Fujiwara no Sanesada
Source: Senzai Wakashu
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