Matching the Rhymes of Hwangbo (皇甫) the Recorder's "Chanting Alone in the Rain"次韻皇甫書記雨中獨詠
Dongguk Isangguk Jip (Collected Works of Minister Yi of the Eastern Country) 東國李相國集 · Yi Gyubo · Compiled 1241 (Goryeo, 28th year of King Gojong); revised and enlarged 1251 · 1 passages · 100 Chinese characters · reading time 1.1 min
Dongguk Isangguk Jip (Collected Works of Minister Yi of the Eastern Country) Former Collection, Book 15 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.
The year is one of bad harvest, and glad sounds are few;
the spring has ripened, and the taste of sleep is long.
I throw down the coin and drink well water to no purpose,
and sleeping deeply I am shut off even from smelling the fragrance.
On the out-of-the-way hillock the time of flowering is late,
and in the needy village even the sunlight is cool.
My coming out was not from seeking Guru (岣嶁),
and my sorrow is like being banished to Hwanggang (黃崗).
Sick of the world, I am too lazy even to lift my face,
and disliking people I do not open my mouth.
Happily you have come as the new Administrator (管記),
and all at once there is light over the whole district.
We speak of old things, and the feeling runs a thousand ways;
forgetting what is in my breast, I laugh one round.
Only because office holds me in check,
I cannot let go of my mad doings with wine.
In the deep lane there is still a fine rain,
and in the sparse woods the evening sun is about to set.
By how deeply I long for you,
I know that you too think of me with yearning.