Ancient Japanese Waka, Tanka and Jisei (Death Poems)

Translation

Featured in New Lyre - Winter 2021

Ancient Japanese Waka & Tanka 

If fields of autumn flowers 
can shed their blossoms, shameless, 
why can't I also frolic here — 
as fearless, wild and blameless? 
—Ono no Komachi, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch  

Watching wan moonlight 
illuminate bare tree limbs, 
my heart also brims, 
overflowing with autumn. 
—Ono no Komachi, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch  

I had thought to pluck 
the flower of forgetfulness 
only to find it 
already blossoming in his heart. 
—Ono no Komachi, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch 

Sad, 
the end that awaits me — 
to think that before autumn yields 
I'll be a pale mist 
shrouding these rice fields. 
—Ono no Komachi, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch