Dawn of Labor

Dawn of Labor, at last translated into English, is the legendary South Korean poet Park Nohae’s first collection, published in 1984 when he was twenty-seven years old. Despite a government ban, the book sold a million copies and propelled Park Nohae as the generation’s leading resistance poet. Dawn of Labor is an enduring classic that shook a society, transformed lives, and demonstrated the power of poetry.

The war of night labor once over,

I pour cold soju over my aching heart.

Ah . . . I can’t go on like this for long.

For sure, I can’t go on like this.

—"Dawn of Labor"

If I ever kill myself, I’ll probably do it at dawn.

—"For a Peaceful Evening"

We too want to become heaven.

Not a dark clouded heaven

that presses down,

but a clear blue heaven

over a world that lifts one another.

—"Heaven