Yetgeul › Dongguk Isangguk Jip (Collected Works of Minister Yi of the Eastern Country) › Latter Collection, Book 11
The Elder Hwan Brought an Image of Avalokiteshvara Painted in Ink and Asked Me for an Encomium幻長老以墨畫觀音像。求予贊。
Dongguk Isangguk Jip (Collected Works of Minister Yi of the Eastern Country) Latter Collection, Book 11 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.
觀世音子。觀音大士。白衣淨相。如月映水。卷葉雙根。聞熏所自。宴坐竹林。虛心是寄。童子何求。曲膝拜跽。若云求法。法亦在爾。畫像者誰。韓子是已。丁君寫竹。能事畢矣。予復贊之。疣贅於二。
O Avalokiteshvara (觀世音) O Great Being Avalokiteshvara (觀音) Your pure form robed in white is as the moon reflected in water Your two ears, like rolled leaves are the place whence the practice of hearing, soaked deep, came forth Seated at ease in the bamboo grove you have lodged your empty heart here What is the boy seeking that he bends his knees, bows, and kneels? If he should say he seeks the Dharma the Dharma is in you as well Who is it that painted the image? Master Han (韓子) is the very one Master Jeong painted the bamboo so all that was worth doing is done Now I make an encomium besides and it has become a needless wen upon the two of them