Yetgeul › Dongguk Isangguk Jip (Collected Works of Minister Yi of the Eastern Country) › Former Collection, Book 12
The Firefly — Again螢 又
Dongguk Isangguk Jip (Collected Works of Minister Yi of the Eastern Country) Former Collection, Book 12 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.
螢火元不焚。徒爾光炳炳。雖於茅屋間。任汝飛自逞。靑熒點草上。淸露炤月烱。飄來入䆫戶。書冊宜可映。雨濕未滅暉。日昇便沈影。信知腐草餘。朽木夜能耿。
The firefly's flame cannot really burn; it only glitters, a light and nothing more. Even among the thatched huts I leave you to fly and show yourself off. Glinting green, you dot the grass above; clear dew catches the moonlight and sparkles. You come fluttering in at the window — enough to light a book by. Soaked by rain, your light does not go out; once the sun rises, your shadow sinks away at once. Now I truly know: what is left of rotted grass can glow in the night like rotting wood.