Poem Meaning and Background
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| Photo by Sławomir Staszczuk |
淡路島・かよふ千鳥の・鳴く声に
Awaji shima・kayou chidori no・naku koe ni
いく夜寝覚めぬ・須磨の関守
ikuyo nezamenu・Suma no sekimori
〜源兼昌（Minamoto no Kanemasa）
Translation
Guard of Suma Gate,
From your sleep, how many nights
Have you awakened
At the cries of sanderlings,
Flying from Awaji Island?
Meaning
This is another poem composed for a poetry contest. The subject of the poem was 「関路の千鳥」(sekiji no chidori), "the plovers by the checkpoint gate" (the above English translation uses "sanderlings" instead of "plovers"). Similar to how the calls of deer indicate a person pining for their lover, the call of the plovers ring out with a sense of sadness. A guard of the checkpoint would have to sleep alone in a hut near the checkpoint at night, so the author is imagining that the calls of the migrating birds would echo the loneliness that the guard must feel while being away from their friends and family. It is said that the author, Kanemasa, was inspired in part by Murasaki Shikibu's "Tale of Genji" and used the location of Suma because that was where the titular character was sent to as a punishment.
淡路島(Awaji shima) is an island located in the Seto Inland Sea (瀬戸内海, setonaikai) and is considered a part of modern day Hyogo Prefecture. 千鳥 (chidori) can be translated as "plovers", and they are a small bird that lives along the shoreline. These animals are an indicator of winter, especially near the ocean, and they are often referenced in waka poetry. Such signifiers of a particular seasons in Japanese poetry are called 風物詩(fuubutsushi). 須磨 (Suma) is located on the coast to the west of Kobe, and 関守(sekimori) refers to the person who guards the gate （gate=関所, sekisho).
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