The bamboo grove

The Sijo is the most popular and most Korean of all traditional Korean poetic forms. Sometimes likened to haiku for its brevity, a typical sijo poem follows a three-line pattern: the first two lines mimicking one another both in form and content and the last line introducing a twist or countertheme which serves to sharpen the meaning. The popularity of sijo in Korea--writers range from royalty to common citizens--is always a challenge for the translator who must often inhabit widely differing backgrounds to completely understand a poem's subtle nuances.