WINTER POND

Jang Seoknam b.1965

(trans. Bro. Anthony of Taize)

I walk across a frozen pond.

Here is where the water-lilies were.

Under here was the black rock where the catfish would hide.

Occasionally a cracking sound as if it is splitting

as love grows deeper.

All the irises are bent over.

My shoulders, knees, feet, that all summer long I saw reflected, sitting on this rock, have frozen like the irises.

They too show no sign of having watched the reflection of something before this.

Although the fourteenth-day moon comes in its course, icily

all remain silent.

Suppose someone comes along,

loud steps treading on the pond,

and addresses me anxiously, saying:

“This is where I used to be.”

“This is where that star used to come.”

This South Korean poet earned an undergraduate degree in creative writing from the Seoul Institute of the Arts and a PhD from the Inha University Graduate School of Literature. Since 2003 he has worked as an Assistant Professor at Hanyang Women's University.

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