Kotoshi sae towarede kurenu sakurabana haru mo munashiki na ni koso arikere

今年さへ訪はれで暮れぬ桜花
春もむなしき名にこそありけれ

Roma-ji: Kotoshi sae towarede kurenu sakurabana haru mo munashiki na ni koso arikere
English Translation: Even this year, too,
unvisited it passed away,
O cherry blossoms—
spring as well, it seems, is but
an empty name and nothing more.
Meaning: Even this year, cherry blossoms, you have passed unvisited—spring, it seems, is only an empty name.
Commentary: Spring Poems 88

Headnote: "Regretting blossoms at the old home"
The poet laments that the cherries of his ruined old home have once again passed the spring without anyone coming to see them. For flowers no one sees, even the name "spring" is empty—he entrusts the loneliness of the old home to the blossoms. Kamo no Mabuchi said the fourth line is in a later manner.
In the Ruijū text the headnote reads "On the spirit of regretting blossoms at the old home." One character in the second line of the base text is hard to read, so the common reading towarede has been adopted.

Line 1: sae adds "even this year," implying the loneliness of years past.
Line 2 means spring ended without visitors, and the poem pauses here.
Line 3 addresses the blossoms of the old home.
Line 4 means "spring too is an empty name," the line Mabuchi judged a later style.
Line 5: koso with the realis kere forms a kakarimusubi expressing realization. It contrasts with 73, where the poet alone visits the mountain cherry that no one cares for.
Author: Minamoto no Sanetomo
Source: Kinkaishu
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