Do not boast of your speed,
O blue-green stream running by the hills:
Once you have reached the wide ocean,
Why not stay here and rest,
When moonlight stuffs the empty hills?
Mountains are steadfast but the mountain streams
Go by, go by,
And yesterdays are like the rushing streams,
They fly, they fly,
And the great heroes, famous for a day,
They die, they die.
Blue mountains speak of my desire.
Green waters reflect my lover's love:
The mountains unchanging,
The waters flowing by.
Sometirnes it seems the waters cannot forget me,
They part in tears, regretting, running away.
His guests are merry and joking.
A distant voyage is like chewing sugar cane,
Sweetness mixed with bitterness.
Return, soon I shall return to my home—
Though beautiful, this is not my land.
Hwang Jini [Hwang Chin-i, Hwang Jin-Yi, pen name Myeongwol "Bright Moon"] (c.1506 - c.1565) Korea
Translated by Peter H. Lee
Source: Anthology of Korean Literature from Early Times to the Nineteenth Century, Compiled and Editied by Peter H. Lee, University of Hawaii Press, 1981
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