Love Poems         Twenty Rounds

Left

河の瀬になびくたま藻のみがくれて人にしられぬ恋もするかな

kawa no se ni nabiku tamamo no migakurete hito ni shirarenu koi mo suru kana

Beneath the river shallows Trails gemweed, Hidden in the waters; She does not know The love I feel.

Ki no Tomonori
156[1]

Right

一たびも恋しとおもふにくるしきは心ぞちぢにくだくべらなる

hitotabi mo koishi to omou ni kurushiki wa kokoro zo chiji ni kudakuberanaru

Briefly Did I love you, I feel, then The pain My heart a thousand, thousandfold Did surely shatter.

157[2]

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[1] Kokinshū XII: 565/Kokin rokujō V: 2664

[2] Shinsen man’yōshū 444/Mandaishū IX: 1760/A minor variant of this poem also occurs in the Poetry Contest held by the Empress during the Reign of the Kanpyō Emperor (30).