Classic Poem

Written in 889, while Michizane was still in Sanuki, this poem is the first in a series of nine quatrains that Michizane tells us he wrote on a sleepless winter night. Two on Buddhist themes are translated later. In others, he recites poetry, hears the wind in an old pine, and so forth. Whereas some of Michizane's poetry is highly allusive and displays learned techniques, these and other more personal poems usually are in a more easily accessible style requiring fewer footnotes.
Unable to sleep, I fitfully spend the night
pained by thoughts of home in the eastern half of the capital,
its bamboo grove and flower garden completely neglected.
I hear a grandchild was born to my daughter in the seventh month.