Tsuki o koso nagameba kokoro ukare ideme yami naru sora ni tadayou ya nazo

月をこそ眺めば心浮かれ出でめ
闇なる空に漂ふやなぞ

Roma-ji: Tsuki o koso nagameba kokoro ukare ideme yami naru sora ni tadayou ya nazo
English Translation: If it were the moon
I gazed on, then my heart might
wander off, it's true;
yet why does it go drifting
through a sky of only dark?
Meaning: If I were gazing at the moon, my heart might well drift away; but why does it wander through a sky of darkness?
Commentary: One Hundred Poems 1550

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Ten Miscellaneous Poems"
The eighth of the ten miscellaneous poems. If he were gazing at the moon, his heart might well drift off, but why does it wander in a dark sky with no moon?
Granting that the moon would lure the heart away, he asks why it wanders out even into an empty dark sky, looking at his unsettled heart. It connects with the heart forever wandering in 1507 among the reflections, and follows the preceding poem on a heart lost in dreams.

First line, “tsuki o koso”: koso is a binding particle answered by me in the third line.
Second line, “nagameba kokoro”: ba is hypothetical, "if I gazed, the heart."
Third line, “ukare ideme”: answering koso with me, the perfective of conjectural mu, "it might drift out," running on concessively; the line has an extra syllable.
Fourth line, “yami naru sora ni”: in the dark, moonless sky, contrasted with the moon of the first line.
Fifth line, “tadayou ya nazo”: nazo means why, "why does it drift?"
Author: Saigyō
Source: Sankashu
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