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Japanese Poetry - Otomo no Yakamochi

Zain

Registered
29 Jan 2014
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Hi,

Years ago I came across the quote:

"Better never to have met you in my dream than to wake and reach for hands that are not there"

Since finding this quote it has always meant a lot to me. After looking online I found that it was actually a poem written by Otomo no Yakamochi and in a book I found that the actual poem was:

What anguish it is
to meet you only in dreams
when I wake at night
and reach out to touch you
but my hand finds nothing

ime no ai wa/ kurushikarikeri/ odorokite/ kakisagure-domo/ te ni mo furenenba

I recently asked a Japanese friend what this poem looked like in Japanese script , and she told me that it very old Japanese that
is not commonly used today. I would love to have this painted in the original old Japanese script to hang on my wall, but I can't seem to find it anywhere. Would anyone be able to help?

Kind Regards,

Zain
 
Otomo no Yakamochi (大伴 家持) was one of the 三十六歌仙 (36 immortals of poetry).

Here is the poem, written two ways. The first, is in kanji used phonetically (an old way of writing called man'yougana), which would be the "original", and the second is kana/kanji mix (as would be more typical in modern Japanese).

夢之相者 苦有家里 覚而 掻探友 手二毛不所觸者
夢の逢ひは 苦しくありけり おどろきて 掻き探れども 手にも触れねば

An image of an old manuscript containing this poem can be seen here. The poem itself is on the right hand page - if you count from right it's the second column marked with a small red circle and starts "夢之" - finishing on the next column to the left where the two characters "觸者" stand by themselves. The smaller marks along the right indicate the pronunciation.
 
Can you explain the meaning of these lines? Please.

Better never to have met you in my dream than to wake and reach for hands that are not there.
 
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