Yetgeul › Dongguk Isangguk Jip (Collected Works of Minister Yi of the Eastern Country) › Latter Collection, Book 9

Climbing the Garden Hill of My House and Looking Out on the Sea登家園望海有作

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 · 50 Chinese characters · reading time 0.5 min

Dongguk Isangguk Jip (Collected Works of Minister Yi of the Eastern Country) Latter Collection, Book 9 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.

滄海杳茫茫。孤舟何處適。我願與之歸。儻向蓬萊碧。不如不望之。空使吾心惻。焉知天上升。反恨海山隔。嗟予猶滯凡。彼此迷所卽。

The blue sea stretches far, vast and vast Where is that lonely boat going I would go back along with it And turn, it may be, toward the blue of Penglai (蓬萊) It were better not to look out on it at all For it only makes my heart ache to no purpose How should I know that, once risen to the heavens I should rather regret that sea and mountain stand between Ah, I am caught in the common world still And lose my way between this side and that, not knowing where to go