Kami ni okeru moji wa makoto no moji nareba uta mo yomiji o tasukezarame ya - Senzai Wakashu(English Translation & Meaning)

上に置ける文字はまことの文字なれば
歌もよみぢを助けざらめや

Roma-ji: Kami ni okeru moji wa makoto no moji nareba uta mo yomiji o tasukezarame ya
English Translation: The letters I placed
at the head of every poem
are the letters of truth;
how then could these poems fail
to help me on the road of death?
Meaning: The letters placed at the head of each poem are the letters of the Buddha's true word; how could these poems fail to help me along the road of verse and the road to the land of the dead?
Commentary: Book Eighteen Miscellaneous Poems III 1199

Headnote: "Written at the end when I composed ten poems placing the syllables of the short spell of Amida at the head of each poem"
He wrote this at the end when he composed ten poems, placing the syllables of Amida's short spell one by one at the head of each poem. The letters placed above are true letters, so how could the poems fail to help on the road of the dead? he says. He claims that by the power of the Buddha's spell set at their heads, even poems composed in play will surely help him on the road after death, and the wit lies in "yomiji," playing on the way of composing, "yomu," and the road of the dead, "yomiji."
The author, "Minamoto no Toshiyori Ason," was a son of the Major Counselor Minamoto no Tsunenobu. He was active in the poetry circle of Emperor Horikawa and compiled the Kin'yō Wakashū at the command of Retired Emperor Shirakawa.
It is the twentieth of the humorous poems. It shares with 1168 in this book, an acrostic placing the syllables "Namu Amida" at the heads of the lines, the conceit of setting the Buddha's name or spell at the head of a poem.

First line, "kami ni okeru": a line of six syllables, one over the count, "placed at the head of each poem," with "ru" the attributive of the continuative "ri."
Second line, "moji wa makoto no": "makoto no moji," the letters of truth, are the letters of the spell, the Buddha's true word.
Third line, "moji nareba": "since they are letters," repeating "moji" from the second line.
Fourth line, "uta mo yomiji o": "yomiji" plays on the way of composing poems and on the road the dead travel.
Fifth line, "tasukezarame ya": "zara" is the irrealis of the negative "zu," "me" the perfective form of the conjectural "mu," and "ya" a rhetorical binding particle, "how could they fail to help? Surely they will."
Author: Minamoto no Toshiyori
Source: Senzai Wakashu
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