56th Modern Korean Literature Translation Awards Poetry Commendation Award: Words Close to the Heart
Cover of Park So-ran's poetry collection "Words Close to the Heart"
Written by Park So-ran
Translated by Ketevani Barbakadze
Words Close to the Heart
A Song Is Nothing
Absence
Naphthalene
I’m Hungry
Little Girl
Address
A Trite Day
The Room of Chance Encounter
Blue Night
The Room of Weeping
Absence
I peer into the mailbox—
a place as deep and dark as the maw of an untamed beast.
How did you know
that there’s no address here?
That there’s no home—
no flushed face throwing open the curtains,
no table glowing red,
no drowsy yawn steeped in light sleep.
That the morning has already lost its way to this place.
I peer into the mailbox at night,
thrusting my hand deep into its hungry core.
The beast clamps its jaws
on the gaunt hand of another trembling beast
and won’t let go.
Blood, cold blood flows
like a cruel prank.
How did you know,
that there’s no weeping here,
that I’ve never learned to howl?
You, the postman of lasting silence,
how,
how did you know?