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Love Song for Hangyeryeong Ridge* scrap

by Moon Chung-heego link Translated by Clare Yougo link October 19, 2016

Author Bio 작가 소개

문정희

Moon Chung-hee

Moon Chung-hee is a poet and endowed chair professor at Dongguk University. She has received the Sowol Poetry Award, the Chong Chi-Yong Literature Prize, the Mogwol Literature Prize, and Sweden’s Cikada Prize. She participated in the International Writing Program at the University of Iowa in 1995. Her books in English translation include Windflower, Woman on the Terrace, AND I Must Be the Wind.

Passing over the Hangyeryeong Ridge in winter
with someone unforgettable
I find myself wishing for a blizzard
though the news rushes to let us know
that prosperity is here after decades of want
cars flaunting their pride of place
I want to be stuck here in the make-believe grip of Hangyeryeong Ridge
 
Ah — dazzling isolation
a fairyland cloaked in white
let my fate, not my feet be bound here
 
At last the day darkens, the richness
turns to fear, reality
starts to soak up its color
yet I wouldn’t wave my hands
even if a helicopter flew over
 
Even if helicopters scatter food for
the birds and wild animals trapped deep in the snow…
 
Once the helicopters scattered black shrapnel
down on young men’s hearts
even if the same helicopters dropped food for deer or pheasants
widely and generously
I wouldn’t let my clothes give me away
 
Gladly trapped on lovely Hangyeryeong Ridge
I’d wonder how to cope in that momentary first bliss of my life


 
Translated by Clare You
 

 

* Han-gye-ryeong is the highest point of several ridges dividing the western and eastern regions of Gangwon Province on the east coast of the Korean peninsula.

 

 

Writer 필자 소개

Moon Chung-hee

Moon Chung-hee

Moon Chung-hee is a poet and endowed chair professor at Dongguk University. She has received the Sowol Poetry Award, the Chong Chi-Yong Literature Prize, the Mogwol Literature Prize, and Sweden’s Cikada Prize. She participated in the International Writing Program at the University of Iowa in 1995. Her books in English translation include Windflower, Woman on the Terrace, and I Must Be the Wind.

Translator 번역가 소개

Clare You

Clare You

Clare You taught and coordinated the Korean program at UC Berkeley, and served as chair of the Center for Korean Studies. She translates modern Korean poetry and fiction into English. Her cotranslations include The Three Way Tavern (UC Press, 2006) and I Must Be the Wind (White Pine Press, 2014). She is a recipient of the Order of Cultural Merit from the South Korean government (2003) and the Manhae Award (2017).

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