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Kokinshu #112
Tuesday, 19 July 2011 07:31 (Topic unknown.)
Why should I resent
the scattering flowers?
Isn't my body
also something that, like them,
decays in this world of ours?
chiru hana o
nani ka uramimu
yo (no) naka ni
waga mi mo tomo ni
aramu mono ka wa
---L.
Why should I resent
the scattering flowers?
Isn't my body
also something that, like them,
decays in this world of ours?
—7 July 2011
(Original author unknown.) "Decays" is interpretive -- literally, the speaker's body is "also something that exists together with (the flowers)," so other verbs are possible. Note that here the ka wa-marked rhetorical question clearly expects a positive answer. I should probably mention, btw, that the phrase I usually translate as "in this world of ours" (yo no naka ni) is literally "in the middle of the world" or more colloquially "within the world." It's often used with a sense of making a universal statement, at least in poetry -- thus my rendering.chiru hana o
nani ka uramimu
yo (no) naka ni
waga mi mo tomo ni
aramu mono ka wa
---L.