Haru no kasumi ie tachiidete yukiniken kigisu tatsu no o yakitekeru kana

春の霞家立ち出でて行きにけん
雉立つ野を焼きてけるかな

Roma-ji: Haru no kasumi ie tachiidete yukiniken kigisu tatsu no o yakitekeru kana
English Translation: Like the haze of spring,
forth from home it must have gone,
rising up and off:
the field where the pheasants rise
has been burned away, alas.
Meaning: As the spring haze rises, so the pheasant must have risen and left its home; the field from which pheasants take flight has been burned.
Commentary: Spring Poems 33

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "On the pheasant"
This is the third pheasant poem. It tells of the pheasant's field being burned in the early spring burning of dead grass. The poet sympathizes with the bird, imagining that just as the spring haze rises, the pheasant too must have risen and left its home.
Repeating tatsu in kasumi, tachiidete and tatsu, the poem links the rising of haze with the pheasant's taking flight. It moves on from the withered field of the preceding poem to the scene of that field being burned.

First line, “haru no kasumi”: the spring haze, a line with an extra syllable; since haze rises, it leads into tachiidete.
Second line, “ie tachiidete”: setting out from its home, the pheasant leaving its nest.
Third line, “yukiniken”: ken is past conjecture, it must have gone away, with a break after the third line.
Fourth line, “kigisu tatsu no o”: the field from which pheasants take flight, repeating tatsu from the second line.
Fifth line, “yakitekeru kana”: it has been burned, closing with the exclamatory kana on the loss of the pheasant's field to the burning.
Author: Saigyō
Source: Sankashu
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