Tori no ko no mada kai nagara aramaseba oba to iu mono wa oiidezaramashi - Kinyo Wakashu(English Translation & Meaning)

鳥の子のまだかひながらあらませば
尾羽といふものは生ひ出でざらまし

Roma-ji: Tori no ko no mada kai nagara aramaseba oba to iu mono wa oiidezaramashi
English Translation: If the little bird
had stayed within its eggshell
never hatching out,
those things that we call tail plumes
would never have sprouted forth
Meaning: Had the chick remained inside its shell, those things called tail feathers would never have grown out.
Commentary: Book Nine Miscellaneous Poems I 567

Had the chick stayed in its shell, the poet says, the things called tail feathers would never have grown. It playfully uses a counterfactual to say that only by hatching and growing has the bird come to have its tail feathers. Following poems 565 and 566, it is another poem on birds, made in a playful spirit.
It is the last of the three bird poems beginning with 565. Kai joins eggshell and worth, singing of a bird grown its tail feathers.

First line, 'tori no ko no', means of the chick, also used for an egg.
Second line, 'mada kai nagara', is a pivot in which kai means both an eggshell and worth, left in kana; it means still in the shell.
Third line, 'aramaseba', means if it had been, mase, the irrealis of the counterfactual mashi, followed by ba to make a contrary-to-fact supposition.
Fourth line, 'oba to iu mono wa', means the things called tail feathers, a hypermetric line.
Final line, 'oiidezaramashi', means would not have grown out, the negative zu followed by the counterfactual mashi, answering maseba in the third line.
Author: Unknown Poet
Source: Kinyo Wakashu
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