Chiritsumoru koke no shita ni mo sakurabana oshimu kokoro ya nao nokoruran - Senzai Wakashu(English Translation & Meaning)

散り積もる苔の下にも桜花
惜しむ心やなほ残るらん

Roma-ji: Chiritsumoru koke no shita ni mo sakurabana oshimu kokoro ya nao nokoruran
English Translation: Even beneath the moss
where the scattered petals lie,
O cherry blossoms,
does the heart that grieved for you
remain there even still?
Meaning: Even beneath the moss where the petals lie heaped, O cherry blossoms, does the heart that grieved for you still remain?
Commentary: Book Seventeen Miscellaneous Poems II 1155

Headnote: "Composed when, on going to Koga around spring, I saw the blossoms scattering near my father the minister's grave and remembered how he once grieved for the flowers"
When he went to Koga in spring, he saw the blossoms scattering near the grave of his father, the Palace Minister Minamoto no Masamichi, and remembering how his father once grieved for the flowers, he composed this poem. Even beneath the moss where the petals heap, O cherry blossoms, does the heart that grieved for you remain, he says. Seeing the flowers pile on the grave, he wonders whether his father's heart, which loved the blossoms and grieved at their falling in life, still lingers beneath the moss and grieves for these falling flowers now, and he cherishes the memory of his late father. The original headnote reads "暮所," which is taken as an error for "墓所," grave, and corrected.
The author, "Provisional Middle Counselor Michichika," is Minamoto no Michichika. A son of the Palace Minister Minamoto no Masamichi, he later rose to Palace Minister and wielded power as maternal grandfather of Emperor Tsuchimikado.
It shares "koke no shita," beneath the moss, with "koke no shita ni wa" in the fourth line of 1144 of this book. It also shares a devotion to the cherry blossoms beyond death with 1067 of this book, which asks that cherries be offered at one's memorial. Like 1052 and 1053 at the opening of the book, it places "sakurabana" in the third line in an address to the flowers, so that a cherry poem appears again near the close of the book.

First line, "chiritsumoru": "where they fall and pile up."
Second line, "koke no shita ni mo": "even beneath the moss of the grave." It is the same expression as "koke no shita ni wa" in the fourth line of 1144 of this book.
Third line, "sakurabana": an address to the blossoms. As in the third lines of 1052 and 1053 at the opening of the book, it is placed in the third line.
Fourth line, "oshimu kokoro ya": "ya" is an interrogative binding particle closing with "ran" in the fifth line. It means the heart with which his father grieved for the flowers in life.
Fifth line, "nao nokoruran": "ran" is the auxiliary of present conjecture, "does it remain even still?"
Author: Minamoto no Michichika
Source: Senzai Wakashu
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