Onaji mi no mezurashikarazu oshimeba ya hana mo kawarazu sakeba chiruran

同じ身の珍しからず惜しめばや
花もかはらず咲けば散るらん

Roma-ji: Onaji mi no mezurashikarazu oshimeba ya hana mo kawarazu sakeba chiruran
English Translation: Is it that the same
self of mine grieves year on year
in the same old way,
that the blossoms, changing not,
bloom and then must fall away?
Meaning: Is it because this same self grieves for them year after year, in the same old way, that the blossoms too, unchanging, fall as soon as they bloom?
Commentary: Spring Poems 154

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "When composing fifteen poems on cherry blossoms"
The poet wonders whether it is because he grieves for the flowers in the same old way every year that the blossoms, too, unchangingly fall as soon as they open.
Laying his own unchanging yearly grief over the blossoms' unchanging yearly fall, he gazes half self-mockingly at the repeated round of spring.

First line, “onaji mi no”: this same self, every year.
Second line, “mezurashikarazu”: with nothing new, in the same old way.
Third line, “oshimeba ya”: is it because I grieve; the interrogative ya forms a kakari-musubi with ran in the fifth line.
Fourth line, “hana mo kawarazu”: the blossoms too, unchanging, matching onaji mi in the first line.
Fifth line, “sakeba chiruran”: fall as soon as they bloom, closing with the conjectural ran.
Author: Saigyō
Source: Sankashu
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