いつしかといぶせかりつる難波がた
蘆こぎそけて御船きにけり
蘆こぎそけて御船きにけり
- Roma-ji
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Itsushika to ibusekaritsuru naniwagata ashi kogisokete mifune kinikeri
- English Translation
-
Long have we waited,
gloomy, wondering when, for
Naniwa's broad flats—
pushing through the reeds we row,
and our good ship has arrived
- Meaning
- Naniwa Bay, which we have waited for so long and so wearily—now our ship has rowed through the reeds and arrived at last.
- Commentary
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45 The Sixth Day of the Second Month: Arrival at Naniwa and the Old Woman of Awaji
On the sixth day of the second month, the party set out from beside the channel markers, reached Naniwa, and entered the river mouth. Everyone, women and old people alike, pressed their hands to their foreheads and rejoiced beyond compare.
"The old woman of Awaji Island" means an old woman from Awaji, the same person as the old woman of Awaji who composed "Oikaze no fukinuru toki wa yuku fune no hote uchite koso ureshikarikere" on the twenty-sixth day of the first month. On this day she was suffering from seasickness.
The old woman from Awaji, who had been lying seasick, rejoiced on hearing that the capital was near, lifted her head from the bottom of the boat, and composed this poem.
Since it came from someone so unexpected, people were astonished. Among them the master of the boat, who was feeling unwell, was greatly impressed and said, "What a poem—it hardly matches the face of someone so seasick!" The next day, the seventh, the master of the boat, so taken with this poem, would squeeze out poems of his own.
The first line, "Itsushika to," expresses impatient waiting: when, oh when. The second line, "ibusekaritsuru," means "gloomy and oppressive," with "tsuru" the attributive form of the perfective auxiliary "tsu." The third line, "naniwagata," is the tidal flats of Naniwa, and the poem pauses here on a noun.
The fourth line, "ashi kogisokete," means "rowing through and pushing aside the reeds." The final line, "mifune kinikeri," closes with the perfective auxiliary "nu" and the exclamatory auxiliary "keri": our good ship has come.
The poem sings freely of the joy of finally arriving at long-awaited Naniwa, rowing through the reeds after a long sea voyage. The surprise of its being composed by an old woman suffering from seasickness is portrayed together with everyone's astonishment.
- Author
- Ki no Tsurayuki
- Source
- Tosa Nikki
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