Yamazato ni iei wa subeshi uguisu no naku hatsukoe no kikamahoshisa ni

山里に家居はすべし鶯の
鳴く初声の聞かまほしさに

Roma-ji: Yamazato ni iei wa subeshi uguisu no naku hatsukoe no kikamahoshisa ni
English Translation: In a mountain village
I ought to make my dwelling,
for the warbler's song,
the very first of the year—
how I long to hear it sing.
Meaning: I should make my home in a mountain village, so much do I long to hear the warbler's first song of the year.
Commentary: Spring Poems 3

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "A poem on the beginning of spring"
The poet longs to live in a mountain village simply to hear the first song of the bush warbler at the start of spring. The warbler's first song was the most cherished sign of spring, and the strength of that longing is shown in the decisive phrasing "I ought to make my dwelling." By inverting the order and placing the reason last, the poem conveys an unaffected yearning.

Line 1, "In a mountain village," names a place where the warbler sings earlier than in the capital.
Line 2, "I ought to make my dwelling": iei means setting up a home, and beshi expresses what is fitting or intended; the poem pauses here.
Line 3, "the warbler's," introduces the bird that heralds spring and recurs throughout the section. The next poem, 4, also ends with the warbler's voice, so warbler poems are placed in sequence.
Line 4: hatsukoe ("first song") is the first call of the year.
Line 5, "how I long to hear it": the stem of the desiderative mahoshi with the suffix sa forms a noun, and ni gives the reason—"out of longing to hear." It stands in inversion with the upper verse.
Author: Minamoto no Sanetomo
Source: Kinkaishu
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