何ゆゑか今日まで物を思はまし
命にかへて逢ふ世なりせば
命にかへて逢ふ世なりせば
- Roma-ji
-
Nani yue ka kyō made mono o omowamashi inochi ni kaete au yo nariseba
- English Translation
-
For what reason then
would I brood until today
upon this my love,
if ours were a bond where we
could meet in exchange for life?
- Meaning
- Why would I still be brooding today, if ours were a bond in which I could meet you at the cost of my life?
- Commentary
-
Love Poems 659
Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Love"
If theirs were a bond in which one could meet the beloved at the cost of one's life, the poet would long since have given his life to meet her and would not have gone on brooding until today. The counterfactual expresses the pain of a love that cannot be met even at the price of life.
Where the preceding poem held life dear in the hope of making the beloved understand, this one longs to meet her even at the cost of life, so that the two poems form a pair turning on life itself.
First line, “nani yue ka”: why; the binding particle ka is rhetorical and answers mashi in the third line.
Second line, “kyō made mono o”: brooding until today.
Third line, “omowamashi”: mashi is counterfactual: would I have brooded? No. The poem breaks after the third line.
Fourth line, “inochi ni kaete”: in exchange for my life.
Fifth line, “au yo nariseba”: yo is the bond between lovers and seba a counterfactual condition: if it were a bond where we could meet; this returns in inversion to the upper verse.
- Author
- Saigyō
- Source
- Sankashu
- Prev Poem
-
Nani to naku sasuga ni oshiki inochi kana arieba hito ya omoishiru tote
- Next Poem
-
Ayametsutsu hito shiru tote mo ikaga sen shinobihatsu beki tamoto naraneba