見る人もなくて散りにき時雨のみ
ふりにし里の秋萩の花
ふりにし里の秋萩の花
- Roma-ji
-
Miru hito mo nakute chiriniki shigure nomi furinishi sato no akihagi no hana
- English Translation
-
With none there to see,
they have scattered and are gone—
where only showers
fall upon the aging village,
the flowers of autumn clover.
- Meaning
- With no one to see them they have scattered—the autumn clover blossoms of this old village, where only the showers fall.
- Commentary
-
Autumn Poems 205
Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Composed on bush clover"
In an old village no longer lived in, where only autumn showers fall, the blossoms of bush clover have scattered without anyone seeing them. The poet lays the loneliness of the abandoned village over the transience of flowers that no one regards.
Line 1, "with none to see," shows the loneliness of no one caring for the flowers.
Line 2: niki, from the perfective nu and the past ki, says "they have scattered," and the poem pauses here.
Line 3, "only the showers," shows that in place of people only the rain comes.
Line 4: furi is a pivot word meaning both the showers "falling" and the village "growing old." Poem 221 also sings of an "aging village."
Line 5 ends on a noun, giving last the scattered flowers. The preceding poem, 204, sang of bush clover whose lower leaves had not yet turned; this poem sings of flowers already fallen, setting before and after the clover's prime side by side.
- Author
- Minamoto no Sanetomo
- Source
- Kinkaishu
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