草枕旅にしあれば妹に恋ひ
眠る間をなみ夢さへ見えず
眠る間をなみ夢さへ見えず
- Roma-ji
-
Kusamakura tabi ni shi areba imo ni koi nemuru ma o nami yume sae miezu
- English Translation
-
Grass for my pillow,
since I am out on a journey,
longing for my love,
I have no time at all for sleep,
and not even dreams appear.
- Meaning
- Since I am on a journey with grass for my pillow, longing for my wife leaves me no time to sleep, and so she does not appear to me even in dreams.
- Commentary
-
Miscellaneous Poems 563
Headnote continued from the preceding poem: "On the heart of travel"
Longing for his wife on the road, the poet cannot sleep, and so cannot even dream of her. The poem follows the plain cadence of the travel poems of the Man'yōshū.
The Ruijū text places it among the "poems found in other and printed texts." Line 4 is hard to read in the source as displayed and is here read nemuru ma o nami.
Line 1, kusamakura, is a pillow word for "journey." It shares its first two lines with the next poem, 564, continuing the hardship of sleeping on the road.
Line 2 means "since I am on a journey," shi being emphatic.
Line 3 means "longing for my wife."
Line 4 means "having no time to sleep," o ... mi expressing cause.
Line 5 means "not even dreams appear," lamenting that sleeplessness denies him even a meeting in dreams.
- Author
- Minamoto no Sanetomo
- Source
- Kinkaishu
- Prev Poem
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Tamaboko no michi wa tōku mo aranaku ni tabi to omoeba wabishikarikeri
- Next Poem
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Kusamakura tabi ni shi areba karigomo no omoi midarete i koso nerarenu