A Legend

He was always drinking,
he went mad, grew rowdy,
then finally the rascal died.

Up the mountain road running past
the village where I was born and bred
is an old tree that's a spirit shrine

with red and yellow strips of rag
hanging.
He became a ghost, squatting there cross-legged.

On summer nights all thick with mist
in bitterness, in bitterness
that rascal wept.

In bitterness, in bitterness,
the old tree also weeps. That rascal
has come to life again, squatting there cross-legged.

(1974)

Translated by Brother Anthony of Taize and Young-Moo Kim