— Overview
The poem, for this reader, holds a common early-morning feeling: sleep is called the easiest thing, and still it will not come.
— Contents and key concepts
A collected volume, and a gap between one and two
The student copies Oh Gyu-won’s poem from the 2002 Moonji collected poems, page 125. The poem had already appeared in a 1978 Moonji collection whose title addresses a child who is not a prince.
In the lines, sleep is said to be as easy as anything. Even that, the speaker cannot do properly. Between one and two in the morning, in a gap of vacant thought, a sudden feeling of living wrongly comes down like a basin of cold water on the head.
A devilish night, and a wet body
He turns over, with nothing to say, eyes still wide. The devilish night holds his wet body and tells him that if he has already lived wrongly, continuing to live wrongly is also a method, and that this, too, is a way of being deceived.
The student hears in that hour the time when a day’s work is not only remembered but dug into, sometimes harshly. The title’s feeling arrives as the conclusion of that digging.
The easiest thing, and still no sleep
The poem, in this reading, sets down a feeling almost anyone has had at dawn: sleep is called the easiest thing, and a hard life can make even that hard. Thought calls up more thought, and a loneliness of the early morning takes hold.
The student wanted to stay with that basin of cold water, and with the night that bargains for one more wrong day. CampusDown keeps the same Korean text at its original length.
Sources
- A student reading of Oh Gyu-won’s poem on a sudden feeling of living wrongly, quoted from the 2002 Moonji collected poems.
Last updated 15 November 2026
Frequently asked questions
Who is the poet, and where is the poem taken from?
Oh Gyu-won. The student quotes the poem from his collected poems, published by Moonji in 2002, page 125. The poem itself had already appeared in a 1978 Moonji collection addressed to a child who is not a prince.
What happens in the poem as it is quoted here?
Between one and two at night, in a gap of reverie, a sudden feeling of living wrongly pours like a basin of cold water over the speaker’s head. He turns over, eyes still open, and a devilish night tells him that if he has already lived wrongly, going on that way is also a method.
What does the student take from it?
Late night is read as a time when feeling runs high, and when a day is dug up rather than merely recalled. Sleep is called the easiest thing in the world, yet a hard life can make even that difficult.
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