Hito shirezu kureyuku toshi o oshimu ma ni haru itou na no tachinubeki kana - Kinyo Wakashu(English Translation & Meaning)

人知れず暮れゆく年を惜しむ間に
春いとふ名の立ちぬべきかな

Roma-ji: Hito shirezu kureyuku toshi o oshimu ma ni haru itou na no tachinubeki kana
English Translation: Secretly I mourn
the year that is slipping away,
and while I grieve,
a name for hating spring
is sure to spread about me
Meaning: While I secretly mourn the passing year, a reputation for disliking spring will surely spread about me.
Commentary: Book Four Winter Poems 300

While secretly mourning the passing year, the poet fears earning a name as one who dislikes the coming of spring. The contradiction that grieving for the year amounts to refusing spring is wittily expressed as a matter of reputation.
Where the preceding poem, 299, regretted the year yet waited for spring for the flowers' sake, this poem worries that regret for the year will brand the poet a hater of spring, and the two form reversed pictures.
From poem 299 through poem 304 in this book come poems lamenting the year's end, bringing the winter book to a close.

First line, 'hito shirezu', means unknown to others, showing a secret regret for the year.
Second line, 'kureyuku toshi o', means the year slipping away, taking up 'that the year should reach its end' in the preceding poem, 299.
Third line, 'oshimu ma ni', means while I grieve over it.
Fourth line, 'haru itou na no', means a name for hating spring, a feeling reversing 'I wait for spring' in the preceding poem.
Final line, 'tachinubeki kana', means is sure to spread, the intensive nu and the conjectural beshi with the exclamatory kana.
Source: Kinyo Wakashu
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