Ōhara wa serifu o yuki no michi ni akete yomo ni wa hito mo kayowazarikeri

大原は芹生を雪の道に開けて
四方には人も通はざりけり

Roma-ji: Ōhara wa serifu o yuki no michi ni akete yomo ni wa hito mo kayowazarikeri
English Translation: At Ōhara,
to Serifu, through the snow
a path is opened;
but in all other quarters
no one comes or goes at all.
Meaning: In Ōhara, only the road to Serifu is kept open through the snow; in every other direction, no one comes or goes.
Commentary: One Hundred Poems 1489

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Ten Poems on Snow"
The seventh of the ten poems on snow. In snowbound Ōhara only the path to Serifu is kept open, and no one travels in any other direction.
Ōhara and Serifu were both mountain villages north of the capital, known as places of retreat. Through actual place names it depicts the isolation of a village with a single track running through the snow, carrying on the loneliness of the neglected village in the preceding poem.

First line, “Ōhara wa”: in Ōhara, a mountain village north of the capital.
Second line, “serifu o yuki no”: Serifu is a mountain village near Ōhara, "the way to Serifu."
Third line, “michi ni akete”: kept open as a path through the snow; the line has an extra syllable.
Fourth line, “yomo ni wa hito mo”: in other directions, no one.
Fifth line, “kayowazarikeri”: keri marks exclamation, "no one travels there."
Author: Saigyō
Source: Sankashu
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