Epic Poem "Mt. Paektu"
By Jo Ki Chon
Juche 36(1947)
By Jo Ki Chon
Juche 36(1947)
Prologue
Friends and brothers! Thirty Millions!
Today must my voice be heard!
May the waves of the Lake of the Heavens
Rising like rampant white tigers
Up to the clouds of the sky
Fill my heart with their cold flooding waters.
It is seared by the withering blasts
Which have raged in ages past
In Korea, this land of mine.
I take in hand my trusty brush,
A poet untried and unknown:
In days of freedom this is my weapon,
The bayonet with which I thrust.
Today must my voice be heard!
The rocky cliffs thrust up into the sky,
Steep and fearful, upward-soaring
Their naked peaks ineffably high,
Far beyond the mists of morning.
But we will launch the ship of memory
Against the rushing tide of time
Back, back to those terrible years
When the warriors of our nation
Made that steep and fearful climb,
And lit upon those soaring peaks
The beacon of our liberation.
Those who fought against Japan
Gave Korea back its freedom,
They passed across the broad River Tuman
They passed across the peaks of Changbai,
Where in every mountain valley
Lie the marks of recent battle.
And now I--a free Korean,
Ascend quite freely to the peak.
My homeland is laid out before me
From a height of three thousand ri.
O ancient ancestral land!
O lifeblood of my people
Running for over fifty centuries
Through our homeland's veins!
We recall how you were spilt
By the knives of the Japanese.
We recall warriors in their thousands
Sleeping on the fallen leaves,
In the dark of Paektu forest,
Entering the Land of Death
Like the door of their father's house.
Speak, grey-headed Paektu!
Who in this free land
Is the champion of the people,
Who their general in the battle?
Atop the mountain stands a tiger,
Like a statue, calm and still
The Paektu tiger of the legend,
With one mighty paw outstretched,
Gazing southward down the hill.
The gorge shakes to his fearsome roaring,
Threatening vengeance to the foe.
In one bound, swift as the wind,
He has vanished in the mist,
And left the wind alone and sighing
To swirl and play among the cliffs.
Recovering my startled wits,
I harken to the whistling wind,
And I seem to hear once more
The echo of that terrible roar.
I stand here high upon the cliff.
Perhaps this is the very spot
Where our partisans crushed our foes
And fulfilled their wrathful oaths,
As deadly as the swords of battle
Perhaps this is where our bold warriors
Raised aloft our freedom banner.
O lofty and unknown cliff
On the ancient ridge of Changbai,
Whose age-old branching roots
Are entwined with the roots of my heart!
I follow the old battle traces
Collecting my thoughts as I go,
Though surely they are unworthy
Of the heroes who battled here.
Still I wish, fellow citizens, brothers,
Though my voice be uncertain and weak,
To sing with my heart and my soul
Of our people's heroic deeds.
Chapter One
1
Hills and mountains, hills and cliffs
Stretch unending out of sight.
Pass one valley on your way
And another lies before you.
Passing along the mountain track
You will see outstretched above you
Spreading branches of ancient oaks
Woven with the cedars' branches.
The valley climbs the mountain slowly,
Feebly descends the other side,
Like a man by work exhausted.
Many hundreds of ri beyond
Lies the thick snow-sprinkled forest.
Even the wild beast comes not here
And no bird will fly this way--
To Changbai ridge's lofty lair.
The howling blizzard heaps up drifts
But between, among the bare cliffs,
The eye discerns a solitary track,
Leading ever up and north,
But who can have passed this way?
Perhaps some hunter gone astray,
Trusting fate to wind and snow?
But why should he northward go,
To where ancient snow-haired Paektu
Ever stands on menacing guard
With his tumbling avalanches
And his icy blizzard breath?
2
Look more closely at this track:
These are not lost and wandering steps.
People passed here in the night,
Bearing arms, in robes of white.
They were a hundred strong and more,
But they left a single track
As they passed on to the north
Amidst the vast and snowy wastes.
And now look--the Japanese
Pass by, floundering as they go.
Dogs lead the detachment on,
Bayonets on guns gleam brightly
The officer's glasses catch the sun.
"There are only one man's tracks,"
Says the officer, astonished,
"Where are all the other devils?"
But his thoughts are left unspoken,
The icy silence rudely broken,
And the glasses tumble down,
With no time to glance around
In the direction of the shot.
3
Then the air is ripped and torn
By the roar of a machine-gun,
And the crackling rifle-fire
Fills the icy Hongsan valley
With a ringing triple echo.
Forward! Forward!
And the white-robed running figures
Hurtled down the cliffy slope
Like an avalanche of stones
Upon the Japanese.
And there was the iron clashing
Of weapons wielded hand to hand,
Bayonets were brightly glinting
Like swift bolts of steel-blue lightning.
"Comrades!
Let not one Japanese
Be left alive by us today!"
4
Thus spoke the partisan commander,
A youth. He ran aloft the hill,
His robes extended like white wings
Up into the heavens soaring.
And his glance, a sabre blade,
Transfixed the field of battle.
"Comrades!
Let not one Japanese
Be left alive by us today!"
The sabre glinted in his hand,
And two Japanese with rifles
Who had still thought to resist,
Lay stretched out upon the snow.
Who is he, this youthful leader
Of victorious partisan struggle,
At whose name the Japanese
Waxing pale, begin to tremble?
Among the people it is said
That they obey his every wish,
That he can join the peaks of Paektu
And then sunder them again;
That like unto a mountain eagle
He can soar from peak to peak.
A star is shining in the north,
Flooding with its brilliant light
The steep banks of the Amnok River.
Among the people it is said
That on the distant peaks of Paektu
Dwells the mighty hero Kim
With a band of fearless warriors.
5
The battle runs its bloody course,
The partisans, the forest warriors,
Gather up their scattered weapons.
Japanese dead litter the valley,
Cut down by the sword of vengeance.
And how many fled in terror,
Unmindful of their emperor's honour,
Or the famous warrior code
Of the noble samurai?
"Not one was left to flee the scene
Of those who bore their weapons here!"
Reports the partisan Chol Ho.
His laugh is like a peony blossom
Scattering petals on the snow.
6
The blizzard howls,
The world is painted white--
Valleys and peaks, and sky and earth.
And cedars bear their load of snow
Like blossom on the apple trees of spring.
Beneath the cedars tents are set,
And sweet smoke rises from a fire,
And the partisans sleep sweetly.
In our tent alone till dawn
A field-lamp burns and splutters feebly.
When the dawn is palely trembling
From the tent of
Chol Ho, political worker, sets out on his journey.
Though the blizzard rage unceasing,
Though the earth be frozen hard as oak.
Still his warrior's heart glows warmly
In the memory of the handshake
And the parting words of
"Take good care, eternal friend Chol Ho!"
7
The blizzard howls in the mountain valleys
Rushing through ravines and groves,
Seeking someone but not finding,
Waling loud in sorrow and in woe;
Or it roars in spite like some wild beast,
And hurls itself against the cliffy walls
And flies across the mountain crests
Rushing madly to the southeast,
To where the ice has bound the Amnok's flow.
Blizzard! Blizzard! Do you know
That with you on the mountain peaks
Travels partisan Chol Ho?
Journeying beyond the Amnok River
To set foot on his native land once more?
Blizzard! Blizzard!
You are also from Changbai,
You must help the partisan!
Chol Ho's road is hard and long,
To southeast, to Songjin and Hamhung,
Past the military border town
That lies along his way.
Blizzard! Blizzard!
Helpmate to the partisan,
Cover Chol Ho with your snowy blasts,
Hide him from rapacious alien eyes,
So that he may cross the Amnok River
And reach his sacred native land once more.