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“Thoughts, a Flock of Crows” by Choi Jeong-Rye
My night to you is midday,and your midday to me as night. Between us lie the breaking wavesof the vast Pacific. Violent waveswander the dark and endless shorelinegrasping at some meaning.But what could there be? Like the act of picking upand setting down a phone in your direction.You who can’t so much as remember my name.…
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“I Met an Old Woman: Day 1” by Choi Ok-Jeong
Day 1: A little girl spat on my shoes. While it didn’t actually hit but just sorta fell between them to the ground, I gave her a shove in the chest with my right hand. I wanted her to smash backwards into the ground and stay planted there, but she shot back up unexpectedly and held…
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“A Prayer for Poetics” by Park Hyeon-Soo
Grant usa speech that neverneeds to spread vocal cords.Let us stand in the worldwith the eyes of a village windarriving unfamiliar each day.Let poetrynot develop as intendedand the spore of imaginationfilled with life drift freely.I trustthat reminiscing is the evidence of old age.Let not the inanimatebring the past to mind,and as larvae eat away their youthlet…
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“Brought to Bend” by Lee Soo-Myeong
You’re standing at the end of a corridor. Tryingnot to go to you,I bent down. Bent towards flowers blooming on the ground.Towards the shadow of flowers in hiding. Having folded,I failed to bloom. While my light was bent,while my day to day was bent,in a corridor once filled with light,nothing bloomed.Tenderly, I held out my…
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“Fifty” by Lee Yeong-Gwang
It’s been a blur, vague like the names of characters I can’t quite rememberfrom a Russian novel I’ve read,but I am fifty. Disorienting, like an old sexual desire which eats Viagrato be able to enter deeper into someone else’s flesh,but at an age of understanding. There were seasons of grief over not being able to be…
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“River” by Hwang In-Sook
Don’t open up to me about how lonely you are, how burdened you are, how much you want to go crazy, how sane you are, about the bugs in your heart
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“Small Love Song” by Hwang Dong-Kyu
I received a letter which held yesterday.The path that had always trailed behind yousuddenly disappeared,and everything that wasn’t the path went with it.Scattered stoneswhich played with us as kidshide away their faces.I love you, I love you…and in the cold, clear night skyI see the steady cracking of gold.A thin snow falls.Unable to settle anywhere on the ground,a pair of…
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“Jealousy is My Strength” by Ki Hyeong-Do
After much time has passed, a weak bookmark will make these pages fall. In the past, my heart filled so many booklets. Foolish, but there was much to write. I was anxious in the open air, wandering aimlessly like a dog beneath a cloud, a stranger to exhaustion. All I have are sighs. In evening…