Au koto wa mi o kaete to mo matsu beki o yoyo o hedaten hodo zo kanashiki - Senzai Wakashu(English Translation & Meaning)

逢ふことは身を変へてとも待つべきを
世々を隔てんほどぞ悲しき

Roma-ji: Au koto wa mi o kaete to mo matsu beki o yoyo o hedaten hodo zo kanashiki
English Translation: Our meeting, even
if I must be born again,
I should wait for it;
yet the lifetimes in between,
how sad, the span that divides
Meaning: Our meeting I should wait for, even if I must be born again; yet how sad, the span of the many lives that will lie between.
Commentary: Book Fourteen Love Poems IV 897

Headnote: "Composed on the heart of love at a poetry contest held at the house of the Regent when he was Minister of the Right"
This poem was composed on the heart of love at a poetry contest held at his house by the Regent Fujiwara no Kanezane when he was Minister of the Right. Meeting, he says, I should wait for even if I must change my body, yet sad is the span of lifetimes between. If they cannot meet in this life, he resolves that he should wait for a time of meeting even in a life to come, yet grieves at the length of the many lifetimes that will lie between. It is a poem that places love within a Buddhist sense of time reaching into lives to come.
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. "The Regent" in the headnote is Kujō Kanezane.
The next poem, 898, is also a love poem from the same poetry contest, and the two stand side by side. Where this poem sings of waiting into lives to come, the next sings of waiting for nightfall in hope of meeting in a dream, so that the same heart of "waiting" is sung at the scale of lifetimes and of a single day.

First line, "au koto wa": "as for meeting," with "wa" marking the topic.
Second line, "mi o kaete to mo": "mi o kau," "to change the body," means to be reborn, and "to mo" is a concessive supposition, "even if I must be reborn."
Third line, "matsu beki o": "beki" is the attributive of "beshi," expressing what ought to be, and "o" an adversative particle, "though I ought to wait." Like "mataruru" in the last line of the next poem, 898, it sings of "waiting."
Fourth line, "yoyo o hedaten": "yoyo" are the many lives succeeding one another, past, present and to come, and "n" an auxiliary of conjecture, "that will lie between."
Fifth line, "hodo zo kanashiki": "hodo" is a length of time, a span, and "zo" an emphatic particle that binds with the attributive "kanashiki."
Author: Fujiwara no Shunzei
Source: Senzai Wakashu
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