POETRY

THE SNOWY NIGHT Oh, my lover who had pure eyes; oh, the silver scales that occupied your eyes. Tonight snow falls. Oh, my poor lover who wrapped my neck with a white towel and washed my face, a sacred quiet descends upon the lonely planet. I close my eyes to remember the time your hands washed my face. (Moon Tae-jun)

THE POEM MAN On this side of eternity, alone, hope, the sun freedom all trace, tomorrow’s poem-being on this side of eternity, alone, sun, saliva, knowledge and unchanging memory of love, all trace tomorrow’s poem-man. On this side of eternity, every second alone, sun, saliva, knowledge and immutable memory of love. All trace confident as they are the backbone freedom, …

FLY ABOVE No true seeker asks guidance from a lost. A wise questions not a madman’s wanderlust! Science is like a mine, your mind is the miner. It takes you to the jewels, finer and finer! For exquisite stones, the rocks are to shove. For real knowledge you must fly above! (Parvin Etesami) http://www.amazon.com/Once-Dewdrop-Etesami-Bibliotheca-Literature/dp/1568590164

YOUR SHOULDERS Your shoulders are sheltering proud rocks. In their slant crawl, the lightly shower of my locks! Your shoulders are the atrium to a majestic tower. At its gate, dance the cheerful chain of my hair! Your shoulders glow, under the golden storm of sunshine, beneath the silver rain of sweat. Your shoulder are to my supplicant eyes a …

EMPTY GARDEN Your pillow howls, I howl. You’re gone, so is your black hair, were you here I’d rest my head on your shoulder. I know your heart beating fast, your pasted-on wings racing with birds, once again you’ve burnt down my lushest forest, left me bereft of you, your absence a knife cuttıng velvet, bloodless. Your pillow weeps, I …

AN EARLY WINTER LETTER Lovely leaves have all been shed, from the mountain ahead of me. Longing for the empty mountain, white snow might fall upon the river. Before the snow falls, I would love to see you. (Kim Yong-taek) http://www.amazon.co.uk/Insaeng-Kim-Yong-taek-sanmunjip/dp/8985599402

FILLING IN THE BLANKS Heaven, you see, is blank, so blank, such a vast blank, I wonder what it takes to fill it. It reminds me of Death, and the way it is registered on a clan’s genealogy. Each entry requires a person to give up his life. On a spring afternoon, my father suddenly passed away, filling a generation’s …

WINDOW OF AN EYE From the window of your eye today I can see the sky. You are a cheerful blue. You, from the window of your eye, lean out toward me, and now, are about to drop. You, in the depth of the window of your eye, firmly, embracing me. Now, you try to rub your cheek on mine, …

IN PERPETUAL SPRING Gardens are also good places to sulk. You pass beds of spiky voodoo lilies and trip over the roots of a sweet gum tree, in search of medieval plants whose leaves, when they drop off turn into birds if they fall on land, and colored carp if they plop into water. Suddenly the archetypal human desire for …

A COLD SPRING A cold spring: the violet was flawed on the lawn. For two weeks or more the trees hesitated; the little leaves waited, carefully indicating their characteristics. Finally a grave green dust settled over your big and aimless hills. One day, in a chill white blast of sunshine, on the side of one a calf was born. The …