小笹原夜半に露吹く秋風を
ややさむしとや虫の鳴くらむ
ややさむしとや虫の鳴くらむ
- Roma-ji
-
Ozasawara yowa ni tsuyu fuku akikaze o yaya samushi to ya mushi no nakuramu
- English Translation
-
On the bamboo moor
blowing through the dew at night,
the wind of autumn—
thinking it a little cold,
is that why the insects cry?
- Meaning
- Do the insects cry because they find a little cold the autumn wind that blows the dew from the bamboo grass at midnight?
- Commentary
-
Autumn Poems 248
Headnote: "Insects"
The poet wonders whether the insects are crying because they too find a little cold the autumn wind that blows the dew off the bamboo grass at midnight. Through the insects' voices he senses the chill of the late-night autumn wind.
The Ruijū and Teika texts give the last line as mushi no wauramu, "do the insects grieve," and because this variant appears alongside the text in the source consulted, it has been taken as mushi no nakuramu in light of the note.
Line 1, ozasawara, is a field thick with low bamboo grass.
Line 2 means "blowing the dew at midnight."
Line 3 presents the autumn wind as what the insects feel as cold.
Line 4 means "thinking it a little cold?", with ya an interrogative binding particle.
Line 5 concludes ya with the attributive of the present conjectural ramu. Insect poems begin here, and crickets and other insects are sung through 256.
- Author
- Minamoto no Sanetomo
- Source
- Kinkaishu
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