三笠山光をさして出でしより
曇らで明けぬ秋の夜の月
曇らで明けぬ秋の夜の月
- Roma-ji
-
Mikasayama hikari o sashite ideshi yori kumorade akenu aki no yo no tsuki
- English Translation
-
Ever since it rose
casting light upon the slopes
of Mount Mikasa,
not once clouded until dawn,
the moon of the autumn night
- Meaning
- Ever since it rose, shedding its light on Mount Mikasa, the autumn moon has shone without a cloud until the dawn.
- Commentary
-
Book Three Autumn Poems 200
From the moment it rose casting its light over Mount Mikasa, the autumn moon shone until dawn without once being clouded. The poem praises the moon that shone unclouded all night long.
Mount Mikasa is the mountain of Kasuga in Nara, the sacred hill of the Kasuga Shrine, tutelary shrine of the Fujiwara. From this poem through poem 204 in this book come poems on the moon of the Kasuga area, of Mount Mikasa and Mount Kasuga.
From poem 174 through poem 217 in this book a long sequence of moon poems follows, from the evening moon through the bright moon of the fifteenth night of the Eighth Month to the moon at dawn, singing of the moon in all its aspects and of the heart that gazes on it.
First line, 'mikasayama', is the mountain at Kasuga in Nara; kasa, umbrella hat, in its name is an associated word with sashite in the second line.
Second line, 'hikari o sashite', is a pivot word in which sasu means both for the moon to shed light and to put up a hat or umbrella.
Third line, 'ideshi yori', means since it rose, shi being the attributive form of the past ki.
Fourth line, 'kumorade akenu', uses the negative conjunctive de: dawn came without clouding.
Final line, 'aki no yo no tsuki', ends on a noun, the same final line as poems 177 and 188 in this book.
- Source
- Kinyo Wakashu
- Prev Poem
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Nagori naku yowa no arashi ni kumo harete kokoro no mama ni sumeru tsuki kana
- Next Poem
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Yado kara zo tsuki no hikari mo masarikeru yo no kumori naku sumeba narikeri