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Matching the Rhymes of Jeong, Librarian-Director, Who Replied to the Poem I Sent Earlier and Came in Person to Give Me Ink Bamboo and a Portrait — Thanking Him for the Ink Bamboo次韻丁秘監和前所寄詩。以墨竹影子親訪見贈 謝墨竹

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 · 170 Chinese characters · reading time 1.8 min

Dongguk Isangguk Jip (Collected Works of Minister Yi of the Eastern Country) Latter Collection, Book 5 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.

予於翫好中。取最不取亞。眼品妄自擡。未肯輕取捨。取書必鍾王。取樂必韶夏。墨竹當取君。求得數四朶。此是士夫戱。孰於君得過。一叢與一莖。已直千金價。有手不自私。且問何時寫。想子下筆時。神鬼助軒簸。方其靜凝神。寧顧大山墮。中有萬尺勢。雲外已逈跨。猶嫌比蕭郞。况更論與可。掃眞君所長。評品莫如我。衆眼亦同看。誰謂吾言詐。愿得新成印。標以篆文赭。家藏囑子孫。勿使人傳借。懸知百世後。此竹貴天下。是時覓君蹟。求馬唐肆者。

Among the things I delight in and love I take the first and not the second. I do not rashly exalt my own eye's judgment and lightly take up or cast away. If I take calligraphy it must be Zhong Yao and Wang Xizhi; if I take music it must be the Shao (韶) and the Xia (夏). As for bamboo painted in ink, it is you I should take, and I begged and obtained a few branches. This is a gentleman's pastime, and who is better at it than you? A single cluster, a single stalk is already worth a thousand in gold. You have hands and do not hoard them for yourself; and I ask besides: at what hour did you paint these? I imagine that when you set down your brush spirits lent their help and heaved like a winnowing fan. Just when you were quietly gathering your mind, had a great mountain collapsed, would you have turned to look? Within them is the force of ten thousand feet, and they already straddle far beyond the clouds. I shrink even from likening them to Xiao Yue (蕭悅) — how much less shall I speak again of Wen Tong (文同)? To bring out the true likeness is your strong point, and in judging it there is no one like me. The eyes of the crowd see as I do; who shall call my words false? I ask that you have a seal newly cut and stamp them with a mark in red seal-script (篆字). I shall keep them at home and charge my descendants never to pass them round or lend them out. Far off I know that a hundred generations hence this bamboo will be prized throughout the world, and whoever seeks your traces then will be like one seeking a horse in an empty market.

Interlinear notes 1

近者。晉陽公使刻印其章曰。東國而安之印。每畫竹標之。

Of late Lord Jinyang (晉陽公) had that seal cut, reading "Seal of Ian of the Eastern Country" (東國而安之印), and he stamps it on his bamboo whenever he paints.

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