ware kikite hito ni wa tsugeku hototogisu omou shiruku mazu koko ni nake
I listen, and To folk will tell, O, cuckoo, so Where I am lost in thoughts of you, Sing here first!
Mitsune 47
Right
かたをかのあしたのはらをとよむまでやまほととぎすいまぞなくなる
kataoka no ashita no hara o toyomu made yamahototogisu ima zo nakunaru
Until in Kataoka The plain of Ashita Does resound The mountain cuckoos Are singing now!
48
When ‘Until in Kataoka / The plain of Ashita / Does resound’ had been recited, His Majesty laughed, saying, ‘It would be impossible for it to resound,’ so the final part of the poem was not recited and it lost.
Composed on the spirit of Spring Rain, when hundred-poem sequences were presented during the reign of Retired Emperor Horikawa (1079-1107; r. 1086-1107).
春雨のふりそめしより片岡の裾野の原ぞあさみどりなる
Farusame no
Furisomesi yori
katawoka no
susono no Fara zo
asamidori naru
Since a spring shower
Started falling,
In Kataoka,
The field of Susono
Has turned the palest green.