朝まだき小野の露霜寒ければ
秋をつらしと鹿ぞ鳴くなる
秋をつらしと鹿ぞ鳴くなる
- Roma-ji
-
Asa madaki ono no tsuyujimo samukereba aki o tsurashi to shika zo nakunaru
- English Translation
-
Early, ere the dawn,
since the frosty dew is cold
on the little moor,
grieving that the autumn's cruel,
I can hear a stag cry out.
- Meaning
- Early, before full dawn, the frosty dew on the moor is so cold that a stag cries out, finding autumn cruel.
- Commentary
-
Autumn Poems 240
Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "Poems on deer"
In the early morning before full light, a stag cries as if lamenting the cruelty of autumn because the frosty dew on the moor is so cold. The poet hears in its cry the harshness of deepening autumn and enters into the stag's feelings.
Line 1, asa madaki, is early morning before full dawn. Whereas the two preceding poems sang of a stag late at night, this one sings of a stag at daybreak, moving time from night to morning.
Line 2: ono means a moor, with o a prefix; tsuyujimo is dew frozen almost to frost.
Line 3 means "since it is cold," with ba after the evaluative form expressing a cause.
Line 4, "finding autumn cruel," surmises the stag's feelings.
Line 5 concludes the binding particle zo with the inferential naru; it is the same last line as 238.
- Author
- Minamoto no Sanetomo
- Source
- Kinkaishu
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