Yetgeul › Dongguk Isangguk Jip (Collected Works of Minister Yi of the Eastern Country) › Former Collection, Book 6
Written at Bongdu Temple題鳳頭寺
Dongguk Isangguk Jip (Collected Works of Minister Yi of the Eastern Country) Former Collection, Book 6 The collected writings of Yi Gyubo of Goryeo, gathered and cut in woodblock by his son Yi Ham in 1241 and revised and enlarged by his grandson Yi Ikbae in 1251. It holds poems and rhapsodies, memorials and reports sent up to the king, records written for temples and pagodas, stele and tomb inscriptions, letters and prefaces, and the state letters that passed to and from the Mongols during the invasions. The Lay of King Dongmyeong, which sings the founder of Goguryeo, stands in volume 3 of the first collection, and the daily life of a man who called himself the White Cloud Layman — with his wine, his zither and his verse — fills the later collection. The book closes with the last poem he wrote as his eyes failed and he laid down the brush, and with the dirge and tomb inscription others made for him after his death.
寺古山猶碧。僧高地更淸。野雲含雨意。松籟僭秋聲。落日鵶邊耿。殘霞𮬾外明。詩人餘習氣。摘葉寫幽情。
Though the temple is old the hills are green still, and the monk being lofty the ground is the purer. The clouds over the fields hold a promise of rain, and the pine wind brings out the sound of autumn before its time. The setting sun glints beside the crows, and the lingering glow is bright beyond the eaves. With a poet's lingering habit I pluck a leaf and write down my secluded feeling.