To the Stars and Birds
Translation by Ethan Fenlon, a first year ETA in Cheonan, Chungcheongnam-do
My experience teaching at an all-boys middle school this year could be described as almost anything but serene. On the more chaotic days, I find it helpful to turn to the quiet good sense of those who came before me. I feel a particular connection with the poet Yoon Kon-Kang, author of “To the stars and birds,” who taught at Boseong Middle School in the 1940s and grew up in my adopted province of Chungcheongnam-do. Yoon often writes with clear, direct imagery influenced by the literary movement known as the Korean Artists’ Proletarian Federation (KAPF). His tone, somber yet resilient, also evokes his experiences as a political prisoner under Japanese colonial rule. Published four years after his release, this poem imagines Yoon’s own dissent like an echo that is heard at long last.
To the stars and birds
If I die without a hope,
laid to rest in tranquil grass
May my untold joy be sung
by the woodland birds.
But at night, the golden stars
will paint above my woeful story.
My friends and rivals, now alike,
might listen on the mountain ridge.
My body was born of a star,
I will not shed a single tear!
My fate is sealed — the day I die,
nature will take my voice and go.
별과 새에게
만약 내가 속절없이 죽어
어느 고요한 풀섶에 묻히면
말하지 못한 나의 기쁜 이야기는
숲에 사는 적은 새가 노래해 주고
밤이면 눈물어린 금빛 눈동자 별떼가
지니고 간 나의 슬픈 이야기를 말해 주리라
그것을 나의 벗과 나의 원수는
어느 작은 산모롱이에서 들으리라
한개 별의 넋을 받아 태어난 몸이니
나는 우지 마자 슬피 우지 말자
나의 명이 다―하여 내가 죽는 날
나는 별과 새에게 내 뜻을 심고 가리라
