Yetgeul › Dongguk Isangguk Jip (Collected Works of Minister Yi of the Eastern Country) › Latter Collection, Book 1
Written on First Wearing a Rhinoceros-Horn Belt初帶犀作
Dongguk Isangguk Jip (Collected Works of Minister Yi of the Eastern Country) Latter Collection, Book 1 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.
望汝知幾日。乘時到此身。瞻前無別樣。耀後爲他人。眼惜斑文背。腰旋皀革頻。連逢下馬客。始覺異常倫。
How many days is it since I longed for you? Taking your time, you have come to this body Look from the front and there is nothing special about it; it shines from behind, so it is for others My eyes cherish its mottled back, my waist girds the black leather often Only when I met guest after guest dismounting to greet me did I know at last that I am not of the common sort