風吹けば川辺涼しく寄る波の
立ち返るべき心地こそせね
立ち返るべき心地こそせね
- Roma-ji
-
Kaze fukeba kawabe suzushiku yoru nami no tachikaerubeki kokochi koso sene
- English Translation
-
When the wind blows
the riverbank turns cool,
and like the waves
that break and turn back again
I have no wish to turn home.
- Meaning
- When the wind blows the riverbank grows cool, and unlike the waves that wash in and turn back, I have no heart at all to turn and go home.
- Commentary
-
Book Two Summer Poems 75
This poem on seeking the cool expresses reluctance to leave a riverbank cooled by the wind in the summer heat. Its charm lies in bringing up the waves that come and go, only to deny that the poet feels any wish to go back.
The final line, "I have no such feeling," negates "I have the feeling" that closes poems 61 and 63, forming a pair of affirmation and negation within the book. The next poem, 76, also sings of coolness by the water, so two poems on seeking the cool follow one another.
First line, "when the wind blows," gives the cause of the coolness.
Second line shows the coolness brought by the river breeze.
Third line, "the waves that break," works as an introduction leading to "turn back" in the fourth line.
Fourth line overlaps waves washing back with a person returning home.
Fifth line forms a concord of koso with ne, the realis of the negative zu. It contrasts with "I have the feeling" in poems 61 and 63.
- Source
- Shika Wakashu
- Prev Poem
-
Satsukiyami ukawa ni tomosu kagaribi no kazu masu mono wa hotaru narikeri
- Next Poem
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Somagawa no ikada no toko no ukimakura natsu wa suzushiki fushi to narikeri