Sacrificing Oneself for the People: The Dying Ox
COOL POEMS: Introduction > THE POEMS
Topic: Sacrificing Oneself for the People
Author: Li Gang (12th c.)
The Dying Ox
I’ve plowed a thousand acres—a thousand bushels of grain;
Vigor exhausted, sinews sore, who could hurt me more?
But if only all the people might finally eat their fill,
I’d gladly lay my broken body in the waning sun.
Comments: Li Gang was a leader of the student movement in the early 12th century. He organized successful student demonstrations that resulted in the dismissal of top officials. Throughout his life he remained a curmudgeon forever bucking the establishment. In this poem he constues himself as a martyr who has sacrificed his life for “the people” Li’s choice to represent himself as an ox is significant because Mencius had compared the people to an ox in one of his more famous arguments.
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