Kumoma naku nagamuru sora mo kakikurashi ika ni shinoburu shigure naruramu - Murasaki Shikibu Nikki(English Translation & Meaning)

雲間なくながむる空もかきくらし
いかにしのぶる時雨れなるらむ

Roma-ji: Kumoma naku nagamuru sora mo kakikurashi ika ni shinoburu shigure naruramu
English Translation: Without a break in clouds,
the sky I gaze at, lost in thought,
has darkened all over—
for whom, and how deep the longing,
falls this autumn shower?
Meaning: The sky I gaze upon in brooding thought, without a single break in the clouds, has darkened all over. For whom, I wonder, does this autumn shower fall in longing?
Commentary: 19 The Autumn-Shower Exchange with Lady Koshōshō

In the tenth month of Kankō 5 (1008), as the imperial visit approached, a letter arrived at the Tsuchimikado mansion from Lady Koshōshō. While Murasaki was writing her reply, an autumn shower suddenly darkened the sky, and the messenger hurried to be off. Murasaki wrote that even the look of the sky stirred her heart and added a clumsy poem, though what it was is not recorded. When it had grown dark, a reply came back from Lady Koshōshō, written on deep purple paper shaded like mist.
Lady Koshōshō was the daughter of Minamoto no Tokimichi and a niece of Michinaga's principal wife, Minamoto no Rinshi, and she served Empress Shōshi as a lady of high rank. She and Murasaki were such close companions that they later shared their quarters.
In answer to Murasaki's letter saying that even the sky unsettled her, Lady Koshōshō sent back this poem as she gazed at the evening sky veiled in the autumn shower.
Without even remembering what she had written before, Murasaki at once replied with "Kotowari no shigure no sora wa kumoma aredo nagamuru sode zo kawaku ma mo naki." The intimacy of the two women appears again later, when they share their sorrows during Murasaki's stay at home and on the night of the Empress's return to the palace.

The first three lines describe the sky, gazed at in brooding thought without a break in the clouds, as darkening completely; to gaze in this sense is to stare absently while lost in melancholy.
The lower verses ask for whom, and with what longing, the autumn shower falls, making the rain an image of tears and entrusting her own heavy heart to the sky. Taking up Murasaki's words about the unsettling sky, the poem joins the two women's hearts as they look up at the same heavens.
Author: Lady Koshōshō
Source: Murasaki Shikibu Nikki
Prev Poem: Mizutori o mizu no ue to ya yoso ni mimu ware mo ukitaru yo o sugushitsutsu
Next Poem: Kotowari no shigure no sora wa kumoma aredo nagamuru sode zo kawaku ma mo naki