Yetgeul › Dongguk Isangguk Jip (Collected Works of Minister Yi of the Eastern Country) › Former Collection, Book 16
Chanting of Bamboo Shoots詠筍
Dongguk Isangguk Jip (Collected Works of Minister Yi of the Eastern Country) Former Collection, Book 16 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.
此君眞勁抗。還有抱兒時。未作琅玕股。猶包錦繡皮。才看尖角出。已見遠鞭馳。中有干霄幹。饞脣且忍飢。
This Gentleman (此君) is truly firm and upright, and yet there are times when he holds a child in his arms. Not yet grown into a jade-like stalk, it is still wrapped in a sheath of silk. Barely had I seen the pointed horn come out when already I see the roots stretched far. Within it is a stalk that will pierce the sky — so, greedy lips, bear your hunger a while.