Ayame ni mo aranu makomo o hikikakeshi kari no yodono no wasurarenu kana - Kinyo Wakashu(English Translation & Meaning)

あやめにもあらぬ真菰を引きかけし
かりのよどのの忘られぬかな

Roma-ji: Ayame ni mo aranu makomo o hikikakeshi kari no yodono no wasurarenu kana
English Translation: Not even irises,
but wild rice was what we hung,
pulled to make it so,
that makeshift room at Yodo,
I cannot forget it
Meaning: That makeshift bedchamber at Yodo, hung with wild rice grass instead of irises, I can never forget.
Commentary: Book Seven Love Poems I 388

The poet cannot forget the night spent in a makeshift bedchamber hung with wild rice grass, not even irises. Laying over kari and yodono both Yodo, where wild rice is cut, and a passing night's chamber, the poem looks back fondly on a single night.
Some manuscripts give a headnote ending 'sent because it was hard to forget.' It would then be a poem sent because the memory would not fade.
The author, Sagami, was a lady poet called Sagami because she had been the wife of Ōe no Kinsuke, Governor of Sagami. She served Princess Shūshi, and one of her poems appears in the Ogura Hyakunin Isshu.

First line, 'ayame ni mo', means not even irises. Like 'ayamegusa' in the opening poem, 350, and the next poem, 389, it sings of the iris.
Second line, 'aranu makomo o', means wild rice that is not that, makomo being a grass that grows at the water's edge.
Third line, 'hikikakeshi', means that we pulled and hung, using the attributive of the past ki.
Fourth line, 'kari no yodono no', is a pivot word in which kari means both kari, cutting the wild rice, and kari, makeshift, and yodono means both Yodo, famed for wild rice, and yodono, a bedchamber, left in kana.
Final line, 'wasurarenu kana', means I cannot forget, the potential ru with the negative zu and the particle kana.
Author: Sagami
Source: Kinyo Wakashu
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