Shiratsuyu no ada ni mo oku ka kuzu no ha ni tamareba kienu kaze taenu ma ni

白露のあだにも置くか葛の葉に
たまれば消えぬ風絶えぬ間に

Roma-ji: Shiratsuyu no ada ni mo oku ka kuzu no ha ni tamareba kienu kaze taenu ma ni
English Translation: How fleeting, white dew,
is the way that you are laid!
On the arrowroot leaves
no sooner gathered than you're gone,
before the wind can even pause.
Meaning: How fleetingly the white dew lies! On the arrowroot leaves it vanishes as soon as it gathers, before the wind has even paused.
Commentary: Autumn Poems 218

Headnote: "Arrowroot"
The white dew on the arrowroot leaves vanishes as soon as it gathers, before the wind has even paused, and the poet laments its fleetingness. He overlays the arrowroot leaves, easily turned over by the wind, with the fragility of the dew that lies on them.
The Ruijū and Teika texts differ in the last line.

Line 1, shiratsuyu, is dew that glistens white.
Line 2: ada means fleeting or fragile, and ka is an exclamatory question; the poem pauses here. The next poem, 219, also uses the word ada, in "the fleeting fields."
Line 3 means "on the leaves of the arrowroot," one of the seven flowers of autumn.
Line 4 means "as soon as it gathers it vanishes," with nu the perfective auxiliary.
Line 5, "before the wind can pause," stresses through inversion how quickly the dew disappears.
Author: Minamoto no Sanetomo
Source: Kinkaishu
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