わぎもこがこやの篠屋の五月雨に
いかで干すらむ夏引きの糸
いかで干すらむ夏引きの糸
- Roma-ji
-
Wagimoko ga koya no shinoya no samidare ni ikade hosuramu natsubiki no ito
- English Translation
-
In the bamboo hut
where my darling dwells at Koya,
in these summer rains
how can she ever get to dry
the thread she draws this summer?
- Meaning
- In the bamboo-thatched hut at Koya where my beloved lives, how can she possibly dry the summer-drawn thread in these endless early-summer rains?
- Commentary
-
Book Two Summer Poems 66
The poet imagines the life of the woman he loves, drawing thread in a humble bamboo-thatched hut during the rainy season. His worry that the thread will never dry in the long rains carries a tender affection for someone far away.
The poem shares the place name Koya with poem 63, and likewise sings of thread. Where the preceding poem, 65, catches the sound of the river, this one turns to the life of a person shut in by the rain.
First line, wagimoko, is an affectionate term for a beloved woman.
Second line plays on koya, meaning both the place name Koya in Settsu and "a hut." Shinoya is a humble house thatched with bamboo grass.
Third line, "early-summer rains," marks the long wet season in which nothing dries.
Fourth line uses ikade for a question and ramu for present conjecture, worrying about someone far away.
Fifth line ends on a noun, "summer-drawn thread," meaning silk reeled from cocoons in summer.
- Author
- Oe no Masafusa
- Source
- Shika Wakashu
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