Practise the thinking. Keep the judgement.
人もをし
Retired Emperor Go-Toba · 後鳥羽院
人もをし
人もうらめし
あぢきなく
世を思ふ故に
もの思ふ身は
Historical kana
ひともをし
ひともうらめし
あぢきなく
よをおもふゆゑに
ものおもふみは
Original English translation
People are dear to me, and people are bitter to me: because I find this world so unsatisfying, I live in troubled thought.
History and context
Go-Toba was a major patron of the Shinkokinshū and was later exiled after the Jōkyū conflict. That later history may shape a reader’s response, but this poem should not simply be labelled an exile composition.
Imagery and wordplay
Affection and resentment coexist. The final lines locate their contradiction in the speaker’s troubled relation to the world.
Zoku Gosenshū · 続後撰集雑中1199
Japanese text and historical kana follow the linked Wikisource transcription. Classical poems can have variant spellings and wording in different anthologies. The source anthology reference identifies the version represented in this collection, not necessarily its earliest surviving text. English prose translations and reading notes are original interpretations; some wordplay permits more than one reading.