秋萩の下葉もいまだうつろはぬに
今朝吹く風は袂寒しも
今朝吹く風は袂寒しも
- Roma-ji
-
Akihagi no shitaba mo imada utsurowanu ni kesa fuku kaze wa tamoto samushimo
- English Translation
-
Of the autumn clover
not a single lower leaf
has yet changed its hue,
yet the wind that blows this morning
chills me through my sleeves.
- Meaning
- Not even the lower leaves of the autumn bush clover have yet changed color, yet the wind blowing this morning feels cold in my sleeves.
- Commentary
-
Autumn Poems 204
Headnote: "Composed on bush clover"
Though not even the lower leaves of the bush clover have yet turned, the wind blowing this morning already feels cold in the poet's sleeves. The poem holds his surprise that the skin senses autumn's deepening before any visible change in the plants.
According to the source's note, the ni of line 3 had dropped out in the original and the editor supplied it following another manuscript; this edition follows that emendation.
Line 1 names the autumn bush clover. Poems on bush clover begin here and continue through 212.
Line 2: shitaba, the lower leaves, were held to be the first to turn.
Line 3 means "though they have not changed," and is hypermetric.
Line 4 means "the wind that blows this morning."
Line 5: mo is an exclamatory particle, ending with the chill felt in the sleeves. Poem 308 sings of the same lower leaves of bush clover faded by the cold wind of the ninth month, so leaves not yet turned and leaves already faded answer each other at autumn's beginning and end.
- Author
- Minamoto no Sanetomo
- Source
- Kinkaishu
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