Mikasayama sashite kinikeri Isonokami furuki miyuki no ato o tazunete - Senzai Wakashu(English Translation & Meaning)

三笠山さして来にけり石上
古き御幸の跡を尋ねて

Roma-ji: Mikasayama sashite kinikeri Isonokami furuki miyuki no ato o tazunete
English Translation: To Mount Mikasa
I have come, setting my course,
seeking out the tracks
of the imperial progress
made so long ago
Meaning: I have come, making for Mount Mikasa, in search of the traces of an imperial visit made long ago.
Commentary: Book Twenty Shinto Poems 1256

Headnote: "Composed when, in the reign of Emperor Go-Ichijō, the emperor made his first visit to the Kasuga Shrine, and she recalled the precedent of the reign of Emperor Ichijō"
This poem was composed when Emperor Go-Ichijō made his first visit to the Kasuga Shrine and she recalled the precedent set in the reign of Emperor Ichijō. I have come making for Mount Mikasa, seeking the traces of an imperial visit of old, she says. The Kasuga Shrine, at the foot of Mount Mikasa, enshrines the tutelary gods of the Fujiwara. She is moved to retrace, in the company of her son Go-Ichijō, the path her late husband Ichijō once took to Kasuga.
The author, "Jōtōmon'in," is Fujiwara no Shōshi. A daughter of Fujiwara no Michinaga, she became empress to Emperor Ichijō and mother of Emperors Go-Ichijō and Go-Suzaku. She is also known as the mistress whom Murasaki Shikibu and Izumi Shikibu served.
This poem opens the book of poems on the gods. 1260 in this book also sings of Mount Mikasa, and the "sashite" of this poem echoes the "sashihajimeken" of that one. Where the closing poem, 1288, ends the book by praying for a thousand years of glory for the reign, this one opens it by seeking the traces of an imperial visit of old, so that a heart that recalls precedent and a prayer for the future answer each other at the beginning and end of the book.

First line, "Mikasayama": the mountain behind the Kasuga Shrine in Yamato. It is the same mountain as "Mikasa no yama ni" in the fourth line of 1260 in this book.
Second line, "sashite kinikeri": "sashite," setting one's course for, plays on "sashite," holding up a hat, after the "kasa," hat, in the name of the first line. "Ni" is perfective and "keri" exclamatory, and the poem pauses here.
Third line, "Isonokami": a pillow word for "furu," to grow old, leading to "furuki" in the fourth line.
Fourth line, "furuki miyuki no": "miyuki" is an imperial outing, here Emperor Ichijō's visit to Kasuga, taking up "the precedent of the reign of Emperor Ichijō" in the headnote.
Fifth line, "ato o tazunete": "seeking out the precedent," which by inversion gives the reason for coming in the second line.
Author: Fujiwara no Shōshi
Source: Senzai Wakashu
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