Hito shirezu musubisometeshi wakakusa no hana no sakari mo sugi ya shinuran - Senzai Wakashu(English Translation & Meaning)

人知れず結びそめてし若草の
花の盛りも過ぎやしぬらん

Roma-ji: Hito shirezu musubisometeshi wakakusa no hana no sakari mo sugi ya shinuran
English Translation: Unknown to any,
the young grass that I first bound
in a secret tie—
its season of full flowering,
has it passed by now, I wonder
Meaning: The young grass I first tied in a secret bond, unknown to anyone—has she by now, I wonder, passed the full bloom of her flowering?
Commentary: Book Fourteen Love Poems IV 888

Headnote: "Composed on the topic 'love long broken off'"
This poem was composed on the topic "love long broken off," a love in which the bond has long been severed. Has the young grass I began to tie in secret, he says, passed the height of its flowering? Likening to young grass the young woman with whom he once secretly exchanged vows, he wonders whether, now that many years have passed since they parted, she too has passed her prime, and the poem conveys a feeling for the length of their separation and for youth gone by.
The author, "Fujiwara no Takanobu Ason," was the son of Fujiwara no Tametsune. His mother was Bifukumon'in no Kaga, and through her remarriage he became the stepson of Fujiwara no Shunzei. He was known as a master of likeness portraiture.

First line, "hito shirezu": "unknown to others, in secret."
Second line, "musubisometeshi": "musubu" means to bind a vow, overlaid with tying grass, and is an associated word for "wakakusa" in the third line. "Somu" means to begin, "te" is the continuative of the completive "tsu," and "shi" the attributive of the past "ki."
Third line, "wakakusa no": "wakakusa" is grass just sprouted, a figure for a young woman.
Fourth line, "hana no sakari mo": the full flowering of the young grass, a figure for the woman's youthful beauty in its prime.
Fifth line, "sugi ya shinuran": "ya" is an interrogative particle, "shi" an emphatic particle, "nu" a completive auxiliary and "ran" an auxiliary of present conjecture, "has it passed, I wonder." It closes by expressing the long time of the topic, "long broken off."
Author: Fujiwara no Takanobu
Source: Senzai Wakashu
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