ほととぎす雲居のよそになりしかば
我ぞなごりの空になかれし
我ぞなごりの空になかれし
- Roma-ji
-
Hototogisu kumoi no yoso ni narishikaba ware zo nagori no sora ni nakareshi
- English Translation
-
The cuckoo has flown
far beyond the clouds, to
a distant place,
and it was I who, in the sky it left,
could not help but cry
- Meaning
- Since the cuckoo has gone far off beyond the clouds, it was I who found myself crying into the sky it left behind.
- Commentary
-
Book Eight Love Poems II 451
When the cuckoo flew away beyond the clouds, the poet says, it was he who cried in its place into the sky it left behind. Overlaying the cuckoo's song with his own weeping, the poem expresses longing for a beloved who has gone far away. Kumoi, the place among the clouds, can also mean the imperial palace, and the poem seems to overlay the beloved's departure to a place beyond reach.
The author, Kinzane, is Fujiwara no Kinzane. A son of Fujiwara no Sanesue, he served as Master of the Crown Prince's Household and rose to Provisional Major Counselor, and was one of the poets of the Horikawa Hundred-Poem Sequences.
First line, 'hototogisu', is the cuckoo, whose song announces summer and stirs the thoughts of love.
Second line, 'kumoi no yoso ni', means far off beyond the clouds. Kumoi is also a word for the imperial palace.
Third line, 'narishikaba', means since it had become so, with shika, the perfective form of the past ki, followed by ba expressing a cause.
Fourth line, 'ware zo nagori no', means it was I, of what remained, the particle zo answered by shi in the final line.
Final line, 'sora ni nakareshi', is a pivot word in which naka means both the cuckoo's singing and my weeping, left in kana. With the spontaneous ru and shi, the attributive of the past ki, it closes in answer to zo in the fourth line.
- Author
- Fujiwara no Kinzane
- Source
- Kinyo Wakashu
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Waga koi no omou bakari no iro ni ideba iwade mo hito ni miemashi mono o
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