Sakurabana saki chiru mireba yamazato ni ware zo ōku no haru wa henikeru

桜花咲き散る見れば山里に
我ぞ多くの春は経にける

Roma-ji: Sakurabana saki chiru mireba yamazato ni ware zo ōku no haru wa henikeru
English Translation: Cherry blossoms bloom,
and I watch them as they fall,
in this mountain village—
how many springs have I, myself,
spent here passing by, I see.
Meaning: Watching the cherry blossoms bloom and scatter here, I realize how many springs I have spent in this mountain village.
Commentary: Spring Poems 57

Headnote: "On an occasion when I had people compose on the same theme"
This poem was written when the poet had people compose on the same theme as the preceding poem, viewing blossoms at a mountain dwelling. Realizing how often he has watched the cherries bloom and fall in the mountain village, he reflects that he has passed many springs there. Kamo no Mabuchi wrote "this too," meaning that, like the preceding poem, it is somewhat good among the middle-period poems.
In the Ruijū text the headnote reads "On the occasion when many people composed on viewing blossoms at a mountain dwelling." One character in the last line of the base text is hard to read, so the common reading haru wa henikeru has been adopted.

Line 1, "Cherry blossoms," names the topic's flowers.
Line 2 means "as I watch them bloom and fall," showing the repeated rise and fall of the flowers.
Line 3, "in this mountain village," takes up the topic's mountain dwelling.
Line 4: zo is a binding particle, drawing the length of years back to the poet himself.
Line 5: keru, the attributive concluding zo, expresses wonder at the many springs passed. Where the preceding poem, 56, spoke of lingering a single day, this one speaks of years in the mountain village, viewing the same theme on two scales, a day and many years.
Author: Minamoto no Sanetomo
Source: Kinkaishu
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