Winning Poems

A Sand Woman (9)

From inside sand a woman was lifted up―

she was intact, not even a hair damaged

After his departure she hadn't slept or eaten, it was said―

though she kept her eyes closed,

and wasn't breathing,

she wasn't dead

People came and took her away―

they undressed her, immersed her in salt water, parted her legs,

cut her hair, opened her chest, I was told

Though they said he had died at the battlefield

and even though the country she left was far away,

the woman held her breath

and didn't release it into the world―

though knife blades went in and out of her body, she would not open her eyes.

They sewed her up again and laid her down inside a glass case―

he, whom she had been awaiting, didn't come, but from four corners fingers pressed in

Every day I looked down vacantly

on two hands they laid out on paper―

after they lifted up the woman hidden inside sand,

I wanted to escape far away from here on a camel

In every dream the woman followed me

and opened her closed eyes like a flash―

the insides of her eyelids were wider and deeper than the desert's night sky

A Woman with Red Scissors (16)

A woman walks out of the obstetrics clinic―

beside her an older woman holds a new baby

The woman's two legs look like scissors―

she walks on them, snipping away upon the snow covered road

but the scissors' blades are mushy like plump dark clouds

Last night lifting up the two blades, she screamed―

what did she cut off

from between her two legs

where the fishy sunset glow poured down?

The morning after a snow storm, the sky rips apart again and again

A flash of light, so bright that it chills your eyes,

follows after the tottering woman

The blinding heaven's top opens and closes

How much was God frightened

when the woman who ate up all the fruits of the tree He nurtured

cut off red bodies

one by one from between her two legs?

The wound of the sky that opens up every morning―

one red head is carved

from between the cloud's plump two red legs

(Whether the blood lives in me)

(Whether I live in the blood)

The woman walks on ahead over there―

she walks on,

tearing the cold shadow with her hot body

Inside the mirror, her body, white like a snow,

a wave of sticky crimson blood splashes slowly―

the new babies are swimming

like a morning sea full of fish.

Onion (21)

A man peeled off a woman's shell under a faucet―

like an onion, her crackling shell came off easily

After a layer of dark night, a clear day arose

Like the tender insides of a fresh egg,

her blood was drained out

"Don't, don't! Why are you doing this?" I cried out

When days get all drained out, nights, tasting sad and hot, rise up

Over tens of thousands of years, day and night repeat this cycle

The woman comes off quickly, easily―

the man who peeled her cried because it hurt his eyes, the woman did the same

Ah, but nevertheless, today has gone and night has come

But where has she been? Where have the layers of hot shell been hidden?

I ask again and again, looking back at the woman's body again

The man, crying again and again, peeled off the woman's shell,

peeled it all the way like an onion

She is not there, the person she called herself―

where has she been hiding with all the hot layers peeled away?

The night only quivers, hiding under the floor―

the sea beyond dresses and undresses incessantly

It was hot in summer, and cold in winter, all have flown away―

isn't it the most beautiful story in the world?

Water in Your Eyes (66)

When I wake up in the morning and sing sad melodies

water in the cup saddens, water in the toilet bowl saddens,

water in the flower vase, which was trickling up flower stalks, saddens,

water inside of the faucet patiently holding a mouthful of water

saddens, too

When you watch the birds outside the window,

don't say they are flying up

because I am falling, and again falling, and falling still

because I am riding on the earth that keeps falling

from high in the air

The running water washes its body as it runs

but this sad music stagnates inside my body

It can't even run out―

the overflow stopper cries and the pipes below cry

I am a body born to run on,

a body born to be the water inside of your body

I don't care if there's no horizon; even if there's no land to stand on,

as long as I can keep on running

in a deep place inside your body― I will not rest, or overflow, or whisper,

if I can be the body born to look at you patiently, the water inside your eyes.

Where has this sad music come from?

Why does it keep pouring over my rotten body?

Why does it make water in my cup cry, make water in my flower vase cry?

Water rises, filling the Han River bank―

not a single street sign can be seen

below, deep below the river bottom,

the sound of cold water running through caves in the bowels of the earth

The ceiling shaking the pillars gets wet,

pots rust― with two eyes wide open,

I push my chest out

I have to get out still holding my breath; I must preserve myself so I don't rot away--

when I find a key, I will get out of here.

Red Sunset Glow (102)

1

On the floor grand white reliefs are spread―

I look down from the airplane upon Everest

It's like flying over the paintings someone has hung

After all, all the mountains and oceans, plains and cities―

are all reliefs

Nobody can escape from above these reliefs

A red feathered mouse is hovering above this all white relief―

it must be looking for someone

2

A woman sitting in a white bathtub cries―

red spots break out all over her body

Even if she splashes the water, it's useless

Even if she pours cold water into the bathtub later, it's useless

Even on the bathtub the red spots break out

The woman becomes one with the all-white bathtub

From the bathtub, and also from the woman's body, sticky red flowers break out

Later the red spots break out upon the white bathroom tiles

3

On the airplane a young woman speaks to an old woman

feeling like an insignificant being who picks up grains

that fell through gravel on this earth, a peripheral corner of the universe

The old woman answers,

wouldn't one get sick since the grain becomes blood?

looking like a beggar

Even the young girl

All together

Look like a beggar

4

On the ceiling of my skull a relief tangles with white clouds,

shoots at the all-white reliefs floating in the air

The shot aims with precise time

as when the clock's hands shoot the menstrual sack―

a red feathered mouse hidden in the relief explodes

Above the eyebrows of the two women who are shooting lying down,

a red pond trickles down―

a life stuck between reliefs cascades with blood

5

I can't walk because the ground is hurting

I can't breathe because the sky is painful

I can't live on the blood

in this hurting body

The Himalayas Speak (109)

Look, they are deep-sea fish―

their feet fixed to the ground their entire life

For them, being born means falling deep,

falling down to the bottom their whole life

Look, they are deep-sea fish-

look at the bodies stuck to the bottom,

as if etched in an engraving―

they are dark, not even a drop of light rises

out of them

Look at the dark masses rolled up with loneliness―

the water pressure must be awful

A woman climbs up with her backpack―

her panting lips will not close

Look, I lost my ring in the deep sea

A meteor falls and strikes the deep sea

In the deep dark sea, my feet can't touch the bottom

my heart floating above the surface is flip-flopping

Once things float by they will not return

Look, there far below the horizon―

the woman is climbing up with her backpack

On her white pants the sunset glows―

waves of blood splash on and off of her

Only when they die do the deep-sea fish lift from the bottom