maki wo hakobu.

薪 is read まき.

It means firewood. This is a useful word to recognize because the kanji is not especially common for beginners, even though the item itself is easy to understand in context.

The particle を marks the direct object of the verb.

So in 薪を運ぶ, 薪 is the thing being carried, and 運ぶ is the action.

A very literal breakdown is:

• 薪 = firewood
• を = direct object marker
• 運ぶ = carry / transport

English uses word order to show this, but Japanese often uses particles like を.

Japanese sentences usually place the main verb at the end. That is one of the most basic word-order differences from English.

So:

• English: carry firewood
• Japanese: firewood + object marker + carry

This end-of-sentence verb pattern is extremely common in Japanese.

運ぶ is in the dictionary form.

This form can be used for:

• a general statement
• a habitual action
• a plain, non-polite sentence
• future meaning, depending on context

So 薪を運ぶ。 could mean something like:

• (I/you/he/she) carry firewood
• (I/you/he/she) will carry firewood

Japanese often leaves the exact time reference to context unless it needs to be made explicit.

Japanese often omits the subject when it is obvious from context or not important.

So 薪を運ぶ。 does not explicitly say:

• I carry firewood
• he carries firewood
• they carry firewood

Any of those could be possible depending on the situation.

If you wanted to include a subject, you could say:

• 私は薪を運ぶ。 = I carry / will carry firewood.
• 彼は薪を運ぶ。 = He carries / will carry firewood.

Japanese nouns usually do not mark singular vs. plural the way English does.

So 薪 can mean:

• firewood
• a piece of firewood
• pieces of firewood
• some firewood

The exact number depends on context.

In many cases, English forces you to choose between firewood and pieces/logs of firewood, but Japanese does not always need to.

Although を is historically wo, in modern standard Japanese it is usually pronounced o.

So 薪を運ぶ is pronounced roughly:

まきをはこぶ
maki o hakobu

You will still see it written as を, but you usually say it like o.

運ぶ means to carry, to transport, or to move something from one place to another.

It often suggests carrying something somewhere, not just holding it.

By contrast, 持つ usually means to hold or to have.

So:

• 薪を運ぶ = carry / transport firewood
• 薪を持つ = hold the firewood

In many situations, 運ぶ sounds more natural if the focus is on moving the firewood.

Yes. The polite form is:

薪を運びます。

This uses the -ます form of 運ぶ.

So:

• plain: 薪を運ぶ。
• polite: 薪を運びます。

Both mean the same basic thing, but the polite version is more appropriate in formal or polite conversation.

The past tense of 運ぶ is 運んだ.

So:

• 薪を運ぶ。 = carry / will carry firewood
• 薪を運んだ。 = carried firewood

Polite past:

• 薪を運びました。

Notice that 運ぶ changes to 運んだ, not 運ぶた. This is a normal verb conjugation pattern in Japanese.