<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Traveler<\/strong><\/p>\n

A windy evening, the acid rain beats down
\nStreet vendors close down their stalls.
\nAfter children, their bare ankles red from playing,
\nLike cockscomb flowers in the square, return to their homes.
\nOnly dirty acid raindrops swarm under the light of unshaded bulbs.<\/p>\n

Returning from a place further away than the clouds above the church steeple,
\nThe traveler, arriving late in the world,
\nFluttering sadness sticking to his collar like glue,
\nThe shadow of dark civilization hang down behind his back,
\nWalks slowly as he opens and holds a bat-like umbrella.<\/p>\n

What could be stronger than loneliness.
\nHe hugs it to his cold body
\nWhile the most beautiful flame that year blooms like a Mandala in an Agung-ie,
\nLet us create a love child with brilliant eyes.<\/p>\n

A woman sings a sad song, picking and taking down leaves, tok, tok,
\nSorrow grows under her ribs all through the night.
\nNear dawn the new moon fades from the sky even as it appears on her fingernails,
\nShe cries as she removes the painted eyebrows from her face.<\/p>\n

Trees are shaken long by the wind.
\nShe should return to the muddy world beyond the field road.
\nInside her body, moss grows,
\nAs, crossing from her wretched time,
\nShe takes out a bird and hands it over.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Note: Agung-ie is the traditional Korean fireplace in the kitchen. It is the starting point of heating the home in Korean traditional houses, called Hanok.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\uc2dc\uc778 \uc7a5\uc11d\uc8fc by Poet, Chang, SeokJoo
\nThe poet, Seok-Ju Chang, was born in Non-San, Chung-Cheong-Nam-Do, South Korea, on January 8, 1955.\u00a0 His first published
\nwork was \u201cMidnight\u201d that he received new and emerging poet award from Monthly Literature<\/em> in 1975. In 1979, he awarded his poem, \u201cFly, Gloomy \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0Dream\u201d inChosun Il-Bo<\/em>, Spring Literature and Dong-A-Il-Bo<\/em>, Spring Literature, Critique, \u201cExistence and Unrealism\u201d.<\/p>\n

.
\nTranslated by Clara Soonhee Kwon-Tatum, Ph.D. and Matthew Lewis, MA<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      Traveler A windy evening, the acid rain beats down Street vendors close down their stalls. After children, their bare ankles red from playing, Like cockscomb flowers in the square, return to their homes. Only dirty acid raindrops swarm under the light of unshaded bulbs. Returning from a place further away than the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1580,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1,36],"tags":[111],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/koreanlit.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1697"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/koreanlit.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/koreanlit.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/koreanlit.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/koreanlit.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1697"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/koreanlit.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1697\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1698,"href":"https:\/\/koreanlit.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1697\/revisions\/1698"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/koreanlit.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1580"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/koreanlit.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1697"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/koreanlit.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1697"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/koreanlit.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1697"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}