The recent article appeared in North Korea's online "newpaper" - and, I swear, I copied and pasted the paragraph breaks as they appeared in the original article. I got to thinking if The Beatles were a North Korean band, a lot of stuff would have come out different: "Sgt Pepper's Glorious and Revolutionary Struggle," "Yellow Nuclear Submarine to Thwart the American Imperialist Pigs," "Hey Juche," etc. You get the idea.
Appealing Lyrics Popular among People
Pyongyang, November 10 (KCNA) -- The lyrics "Forgive Me", "Mother" and "My Fatherland" are being widely recited among the working people and school children and youth in the DPRK. The lyrics, which were created scores of years ago, still strongly appeal to the people for their rich emotion.
Famous poet Kim Chol had this to say: I wrote the rough copy of the lyric "Forgive Me" during the hard-fought Fatherland Liberation War. Looking back on their childhood when they did not realize how deep was the happiness provided by the great President Kim Il Sung, soldiers of the Korean People's Army on the assault line hardened their mind to dedicate their lives to the defence of the leader and begged from the bottom of their hearts the fatherland's pardon for having neither more gallantly fought nor done more things for the country.
The patriotic spirit of the soldiers in 1950s still deeply moves the people.
The Korean people have experienced that the Workers' Party of Korea and the socialist motherland are best and that they cannot live even a moment apart from them while overcoming the ordeals of history under the guidance of the Party.
It is the unbreakable faith of the Korean people and soldiers to believe in and follow the WPK as eternal bosom to be embraced and as the mother of the revolution. The Party shares blood with them and protects their destiny and future.
I have reflected their ardent feeling in my poem "Mother".
The lyric "My Fatherland" by Kim Sang O sings of the love for the fatherland providing the people with independence on the basis of the revolutionary outlook on the leader, not the love merely for the country where they were born and have grown up. It thus touches the heartstrings of the people.
As they truthfully depict the noble ideological and spiritual world of the people on the basis of experience, the poems always call the Korean people to fresh struggle and feats with great vitality and influence.
