Kurenai ni shioreshi sode mo kuchihatenu araba ya hito ni iro mo misubeki - Senzai Wakashu(English Translation & Meaning)

紅にしをれし袖も朽ち果てぬ
あらばや人に色も見すべき

Roma-ji: Kurenai ni shioreshi sode mo kuchihatenu araba ya hito ni iro mo misubeki
English Translation: Drooping with crimson,
even my sleeves have rotted
away, every thread:
were they here, to him
I would show their color
Meaning: Even my sleeves, drooping and soaked with crimson tears, have rotted away; were they still here, I would show him their color.
Commentary: Book Thirteen Love Poems III 832

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Topic unknown"
Even my sleeves, drooping with crimson, have rotted away, she says; were they still here, I would show their color to him. Her sleeves have rotted away with the crimson tears of blood shed in love's grief, and though she would show him the sleeves dyed with the color of her tears to let him know the depth of her love, not even the sleeves remain, a grief of love at its extreme.
The author, "Wakamizu of the Empress Dowager's household," was a lady-in-waiting to an Empress Dowager. Little is known of her career.
Poem 808 of this book sings of sleeves that should wrap one's joy rotted away by tears, and this one of sleeves that should show one's love rotted away, so that both answer each other in singing of sleeves "rotted away."

First line, "kurenai ni": "with crimson," with tears of blood. Tears shed in excess of love's grief were said to be dyed crimson.
Second line, "shioreshi sode mo": "shioru" is to droop with wetness, "even my sleeves drooping with crimson tears."
Third line, "kuchihatenu": "nu" is perfective, "have rotted away utterly." The poem pauses here. Like "kuchihatenikeri" in the last line of 808 of this book, it sings of sleeves rotted by tears.
Fourth line, "araba ya hito ni": "ba" is conditional and "ya" an interrogative particle that binds with "beki" in the last line, "were they here, to him."
Fifth line, "iro mo misubeki": "beki" is the attributive of the conjectural "beshi," concluding "ya," "I would show him their color," lamenting that not even sleeves remain to show him.
Author: Wakamizu
Source: Senzai Wakashu
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