Jeong Ho-seung's poem (5)

A Spring Path

Translated by Brother Anthony and Susan Hwang

Even where a path ends

there's a path.

Even where a path ends

there's someone becoming a path.

There's someone becoming a spring path

and endlessly walking along.

Rivers flow on, then stop,

birds fly off and do not return,

and though all the petals between heaven and earth fall and scatter, behold,

even where love has ended

there's someone remaining as love.

There's someone becoming love

and endlessly walking along a spring path.

The Korea Times has begun to publish Jeong Ho-seung's poems every Thursday. Jeong is the most widely read and well-loved poet in Korea today. His work expresses the joy and sorrow of life in ways that are immediately accessible to people of all ages. Spring does not last, the poem reminds us, it comes to an end, just as paths and rivers do. Yet in human life the end is not an end but a new beginning. The transience of nature is familiar but the poem reminds us that true love endures beyond all transience. Love is not like birds and leaves, here today and gone tomorrow. Love is renewed to the very end, and is found to be an unending spring path.

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