For Today Is

Since it’s such a nice and beautiful day why not become a piece of cloud myself or a stream of water, and go. If it happens to be a cloud, looking down a side of a mountain floating in the middle of the air; or if it happens to be water, bathing in the basin under the shade on a foot of mountain at times and merge in the plain drifting through the valleys. How do I do manage today? Because it is raining all day. Should I visit a tavern and have a drink to get mellow? Or become a tree frog(1) and cry my eyes out? If neither of them are feasible, walk in the rain to find my place to stay and when my feet are mired, just stand there to become a totem pole and chitchat with the rain by a roadside stream. Why the wind howls today? Is it because Jonah incurred God’s anger? Or because Shimchung(2) has to throw herself in the raging water? Oh well, since no one knows where the wind comes from, why not blown myself in the wind become a Manjang(3) and visit the netherworld where Hades reigns. 1. Korean folktale Chonggeguri. Story of a disobedient tree frog. 2. Korean fairytale Shimchung-Jon. Story of a filial daughter Shimchung. 3. A streamer made with a piece of silk, cotton, or hemp cloth on which funeral ode is written. This streamer is carried by a person who goes before the colorfully decorated bier to let the people know that dead person is coming as well as to express the mourning for the dead in Korean traditional funeral procession.