裾野焼く煙ぞ春は吉野山
花を隔つる霞なりける
花を隔つる霞なりける
- Roma-ji
-
Susono yaku keburi zo haru wa Yoshinoyama hana o hedatsuru kasumi narikeru
- English Translation
-
Smoke from fields they burn
at the foot is, in the spring,
on Mount Yoshino,
the haze that comes between me
and the blossoms I would see.
- Meaning
- In spring on Mount Yoshino, it is the smoke from the burning foothills that is the haze screening off the blossoms.
- Commentary
-
Spring Poems 85
Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "When composing many poems on cherry blossoms"
The poet realizes that the haze screening the blossoms of Mount Yoshino from view is really the smoke of the foothills being burned in spring.
The conceit of haze as smoke echoes 12, where the smoke of salt fires joins the spring haze. Here, for one who longs to gaze at the flowers, the smoke that hides them is cast as something to resent.
First line, “susono yaku”: burning the fields at the foot of the mountain, the spring field-burning.
Second line, “keburi zo haru wa”: the emphatic zo forms a kakari-musubi with the attributive keru in the fifth line.
Third line, “Yoshinoyama”: Mount Yoshino in Yamato, famed for its cherries.
Fourth line, “hana o hedatsuru”: screening the blossoms from view.
Fifth line, “kasumi narikeru”: it was the haze, ending in the attributive form in answer to zo, revealing that the haze was smoke.
- Author
- Saigyō
- Source
- Sankashu
- Prev Poem
-
Narai arite kaze sasou tomo yamazakura tazunuru ware o machitsukete chire
- Next Poem
-
Ima yori wa hana min hito ni tsutaeokan yo o nogaretsutsu yama ni sumae to