Hayasegawa tsunade no kishi o oki ni mite noboriwazurau samidare no koro

早瀬川綱手の岸を沖に見て
上りわづらふ五月雨の頃

Roma-ji: Hayasegawa tsunade no kishi o oki ni mite noboriwazurau samidare no koro
English Translation: On the rapid stream,
the bank where tow ropes are hauled
looks far out at sea,
and the boats struggle upstream
in this time of summer rains.
Meaning: On the swift river, the bank where boats are hauled by tow ropes now looks as distant as the open water, and the boats struggle to make their way upstream in the early summer rains.
Commentary: Summer Poems 218

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "When fifteen poems on the early summer rains were composed at a certain place, written on behalf of another"
This is the fourth of the fifteen poems. Boats going upstream are hauled by ropes from the bank, but the rains have swollen the river until the towing bank seems as far off as the open sea, and the boats struggle to go up.
Where the preceding poem spoke of the channel markers out in the stream, this one says the bank itself looks like open water, depicting the river widened by the flood. The same word oki, out in the stream, is used while the thing seen is reversed.

First line, “Hayasegawa”: a river with a swift current.
Second line, “tsunade no kishi o”: tsunade are the ropes used to haul boats from the bank, and this is the bank along which they are pulled.
Third line, “oki ni mite”: the river has widened with the flood until the bank seems as distant as the open water; the line uses the same word oki as the second line of the preceding poem.
Fourth line, “noboriwazurau”: struggling to make one's way upstream.
Fifth line, “samidare no koro”: the poem ends on a noun, closing with the line shared by the group of rain poems.
Author: Saigyō
Source: Sankashu
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