Toward the Place Called Human
May,
The climbing roses line up,
making their way
toward the place called “flower.“
They go year after year, yet it seems they’ve never arrived.
From fence to wall,
an endless procession.
From road to road,
people in lines,
making their way
toward the place called “human.“
All life is
But only,
a red rose.
Merely a place we journey toward
Gunsan
Midday sunlight in Gunsan,
whiter than the flesh of a white fish.
Life is a bundle of hunger.
The fisherman,
trying to grasp anything at all,
casts his net
again and again.
Homes like fish farms,
stories of daily life growing like young fry in shallow waters,
a life half-raw no matter how much it’s cooked,
slipping away like a fish freshly caught.
Old streets shine only when scrubbed like brass bowls.
Once polished, they glimmer, brimming with wide-awake brass,
we mix white barley rice and eat.
Flying fish roe, each bead holding a story from the sea,
spill out like bursts of laughter “giggling”, bright.
Beyond the swarms of people moving like anchovy shoals,
a passing landscape pauses
like an old friend to say hello.
Life ripens as it passes like fruit.
On the roadside, beyond a wall, a persimmon is ripening.
Charcoal burned by day
in the black night,
someone is lighting a fire of red and flame.
Gunsan
Midday sunlight in Gunsan,
whiter than the flesh of a white fish.
Life is a bundle of hunger.
The fisherman,
trying to grasp anything at all,
casts his net
again and again.
Homes like fish farms,
stories of daily life growing like young fry in shallow waters,
a life half-raw no matter how much it’s cooked,
slipping away like a fish freshly caught.
Old streets shine only when scrubbed like brass bowls.
Once polished, they glimmer, brimming with wide-awake brass,
we mix white barley rice and eat.
Flying fish roe, each bead holding a story from the sea,
spill out like bursts of laughter “giggling”, bright.
Beyond the swarms of people moving like anchovy shoals,
a passing landscape pauses
like an old friend to say hello.
Life ripens as it passes like fruit.
On the roadside, beyond a wall, a persimmon is ripening.
Charcoal burned by day
in the black night,
someone is lighting a fire of red and flame.
