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 · 3 passages · 84 Chinese characters · reading time 0.9 min
Dongguk Isangguk Jip (Collected Works of Minister Yi of the Eastern Country) Latter Collection, Book 3 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.
紅他桃杏三春力。綠盡郊原一雨功。和氣蕩人能不感。芳情猶到老衰翁。
What reddened the peach and apricot blossoms is the force of three months of spring
And what turned the fields green all over is the work of a single rain
The genial air stirs a man, so how should he not feel it
A flowering heart reaches even an old man, old and failing
Interlinear notes 1
三首
Three poems.
花專向我披心赤。柳欲迎誰擧眼靑。景物惱情何大逼。可堪無酒也虛經。
The flowers open their red hearts toward me alone
And for whom do the willows open their green eyes
Why does the scenery press so hard upon my mind
How could I bear to let it pass in vain with no wine
春光解展萬人眉。剝取於吾只此詩。不與一歡全與瘦。何須吟盡百花爲。
The spring light knows how to smooth the brows of ten thousand people
But what it has stripped from me is only this poem
It gives not one joy and gives nothing but gauntness
So what good is it to chant of every flower there is