Chirinureba tou hito mo nashi furusato wa hana zo mukashi no aruji narikeru

散りぬれば訪ふ人もなし故郷は
花ぞ昔の主なりける

Roma-ji: Chirinureba tou hito mo nashi furusato wa hana zo mukashi no aruji narikeru
English Translation: Once they've scattered down,
no one comes to visit here;
at the old homestead,
the blossoms, it turns out, were
the masters of the days of old.
Meaning: Once the blossoms have fallen, no one comes to visit—at this old home it was the blossoms, I realize, that were the true masters all along.
Commentary: Spring Poems 89

Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Regretting blossoms at the old home"
At an old home where no one visits once the blossoms fall, the poet realizes that the flowers that drew people there were the masters of old. He regards the blossoms, which go on blooming after the people have gone, as the true masters of the old home, with a feeling of nostalgia. Kamo no Mabuchi said the lower verse is in a later manner.
The poem draws on Ki no Tsurayuki's Kokinshū poem in which the blossoms at the old place bloom with the scent of old. The Ruijū and Teika texts differ from the second line on. Some characters in the base text are hard to read and have been supplied from the Waka Database text.

Line 1 gives a settled condition: "once they have fallen."
Line 2 means no one comes to visit, and the poem pauses here.
Line 3, "at the old homestead," takes up the topic.
Line 4: zo emphasizes "the blossoms indeed," using Tsurayuki's hana zo mukashi no as it is.
Line 5 concludes zo with the attributive. Where 63 lamented that the blossoms no longer belong to their old master, here the poet reverses it: the blossoms themselves were the masters of old.
Author: Minamoto no Sanetomo
Source: Kinkaishu
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