Road

황지우

 

길

 

삶이란

얼마간 굴욕을 지불해야

지나갈 수 있는 길이라는 생각

 

돌아다녀보면

朝鮮八道,

모든 명당은 초소다

 

한려수도, 내항선이 배때기로 긴 자국

지나가고 나니 길이었구나

거품 같은 길이여

 

세상에, 할 고민 없어 괴로워하는 자들아

다 이리로 오라

가다보면 길이 거품이 되는 여기

내가 내린 닻, 내 덫이었구나

 

Hwang Ji-U

 

Road

 

The thought that life

is a road that can only be traveled

at the price of some humiliation.

 

As you go traveling around

all the roads throughout our land,

every propitious grave site is a guard post.

 

The wake left behind by the belly of a ship

passing through the Hallyeo Channel was a road,

a foam-like road.

 

Let all the people in the world who are suffering

from having nothing to worry about join me here.

Here, where the road turned into foam as I went along,

the anchor I dropped, was my snare.

 

Hwang Ji-u was born in Haenam, Jeollanamdo in 1952.

Translation by Brother Anthony of Taize.