KKS 49
Text
人の家に、植ゑたりける桜の花、咲きはじめたりけるを見てよめる
He saw cherry blossoms, that had recently been planted at a person’s house, blooming for the first time, and read this.
貫之
今年より春知りそむる桜花散るといふことはならはざらなん
|
kotoshi yori |
You who this year |
Notes
Other sources:
Analysis
This is the first poem in the group of sakura (cherry blossom) poems. The next 70 poems are on cherry blossoms, showing the great importance of this theme in the Heian period. This contrasts with the Man'yōshū and Chinese poetry, where plum blossoms are a far more important image. The remaining 20 poems in the first volume are on blooming cherry trees.
The first poem, while on the theme of the first bloom of cherries, contains the "scattering" that is the true keynote of the cherry blossom in Heian poetry (also providing a link to the previous poem on scattering plum blossoms). Tsurayuki personifies the trees, and feigns addressing them like a child – they will learn various things from the other older trees, but he hopes that they won’t learn to scatter their blossoms.
