Yetgeul › Dongguk Isangguk Jip (Collected Works of Minister Yi of the Eastern Country) › Former Collection, Book 7
Dashing Off a Poem to Thank the Zen Master Hui for the Gift of Rice走筆謝希禪師惠米
Dongguk Isangguk Jip (Collected Works of Minister Yi of the Eastern Country) Former Collection, Book 7 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.
嗟我落寒貧。渾家皆食粥。亮非飡霞人。何由得辟穀。仁哉法師心。憐我無寸祿。惠然送白粲。粒粒眞輭玉。何煩顔公帖。已貸監河粟。扊扅方暮炊。寒廚煙始綠。猶堪咲三閭。冷淡湌秋菊。
Alas, I have fallen into bitter poverty, and my whole household eats nothing but gruel. I am truly no man who feeds on sunset clouds, so how could I give up grain altogether? How kind is the heart of the Master of the Law, who pitied me for having not an inch of salary and readily sent me white polished rice, every grain of it truly soft jade. Why trouble Lord Yan (顔公) with a note? I have already borrowed the grain of Jianhe (監河). The door-bar is at last set cooking at evening, and in the cold kitchen the smoke begins to go green. Still I may laugh at the Grand Master of the Three Wards (三閭大夫), who in his cool austerity ate autumn chrysanthemums.