Mono omou to namida ya yagate Mitsusegawa hito o shizumuru fuchi to naruran

物思ふと涙ややがて三瀬川
人を沈むる淵となるらん

Roma-ji: Mono omou to namida ya yagate Mitsusegawa hito o shizumuru fuchi to naruran
English Translation: As I brood on love,
will my tears before too long
become the River
of Three Crossings, and a pool
where people sink and drown?
Meaning: Will the tears I shed in brooding over love one day become the River of Three Crossings, a deep pool where people sink and drown?
Commentary: Love Poems 709

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Love"
Will the tears he sheds in brooding over love one day become the Mitsusegawa, the River of Three Crossings, and turn into a deep pool that drowns people after death? The Mitsusegawa is the river the dead are said to cross, and by extending the abundance of love's tears to the river of the underworld, the poet expresses his fear that attachment in love may lead to suffering in the life to come.
Following the preceding poem's resentment lasting into the next life, this one too turns to the world after death, and as the love section draws to a close, poems linking love with suffering in the next life follow one another.

First line, “mono omou to”: in brooding over love; the line has six syllables, one too many.
Second line, “namida ya yagate”: the binding particle ya marks a question and answers ran at the end; yagate is in time, before long.
Third line, “Mitsusegawa”: the river of three crossings that the dead are said to cross on the way to the underworld.
Fourth line, “hito o shizumuru”: drowning people, drawing on the belief that the sinful sink in that river.
Fifth line, “fuchi to naruran”: fuchi is a deep, still pool: will it become one? closing in the attributive form answering ya.
Author: Saigyō
Source: Sankashu
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