まだ知らぬことをばいかが教ふべき
人を忘るる身にしあらねば
人を忘るる身にしあらねば
- Roma-ji
-
Mada shiranu koto o ba ikaga oshiu beki hito o wasururu mi ni shi araneba
- English Translation
-
Something I have not
yet come to know, how could I
teach it to you, then,
when I am not one who knows
how to forget the one I love
- Meaning
- How could I teach you something I have never known? I am not one who forgets the one I love.
- Commentary
-
Book Eight Love Poems II 268
Answering the preceding poem's plea to be taught how to forget, the poet retorts that since she has never forgotten anyone, she cannot teach what she does not know. Deftly deflecting the charge of having forgotten, she declares instead a heart that has never changed.
The first line, "mada shiranu" (not yet known), marks something never experienced.
The second line, "koto o ba ikaga," singles it out with "ba" and leads into a rhetorical question with "ikaga" (how).
The third line, "oshiu beki," uses the attributive "beki" in a potential sense — how could I teach it? — with a break after the third line. It takes up "oshieyo" (teach me) in the preceding poem, 267.
The fourth line, "hito o wasururu," uses for the third time the line shared by the two preceding poems, closing the sequence on forgetting.
The final line, "mi ni shi araneba," uses the intensifier "shi" and the perfective negative with "ba" to give, by inversion, the reason: since I am not one who forgets.
- Author
- Yushi Naishinno-ke no Koben
- Source
- Shika Wakashu
- Prev Poem
-
Saritote wa tare ni ka iwamu ima wa tada hito o wasururu kokoro oshieyo
- Next Poem
-
Ikukaeri tsurashi to hito o Mikumano no urameshi nagara koishikaruramu