Star Soup
Penniless mother
always made poor man’s soup
When I returned from school
she sat me down on the floor like a guest
Leaving the kitchen carefully cradling
the dinner tray with a white china bowl
The stars that floated in the soup
Sometimes a moon got scooped up in my spoon
and I was full
As if the rattling of the the spoon and the stars
against the bare dish resounded in her heart
a starlight śarīra* fell
from my mother’s eye
*a Buddhist relic found in the ashes of Buddhist spiritual masters resembling pearl or crystal.
별국
가난한 어머니는
항상 멀덕국*을 끓이셨다
학교에서 돌아온 나를
손님처럼 마루에 앉히시고
흰 사기그릇이 앉아 있는 밥상을
조심조심 받들고 부엌에서 나오셨다
국물 속에 떠 있던 별들
어떤 때는 숟가락에 달이 건져 올라와
배가 불렀다
숟가락과 별이 부딪치는
맑은 국그릇 소리가 가슴을 울렸는지
어머니의 눈에서
별빛 사리가 쏟아졌다
*멀덕국: 멀건 국
Translated by Cate Boram with Ko, YuJin
