Hole

I suppose just outside the desire to touch lies the desire to stay away. A mind and a mind were stuck together. White and white wouldn’t come apart. What is empty is filled to the brim. If I make a fist and give it a push, it will sink right in. It will sink right in and I will never get it back. The cold, stiff lumps of muscle. The monitor was cold late at night. It was paused. Time and time were stuck together. Sentence and sentence wouldn’t come apart. The ones who clenched their eyes too hard—they are dead. Their insides were caves. Their eyes had been closed for so long, the water was over a hundred meters deep. Water was stuck to water. Darkness and darkness wouldn’t come apart. Someone went in with a candle. Their webbed feet, so elegant, swiftly glided over to a faraway moment. Was the last thing they heard their own first cry? Is a moment just outside eternity? The dead eye flinched. From its waxy face, an eyelash fell.

Downstream

God is lying in the dark one-person room at the far end of the hallway.

It’s like God hung us outside the window and forgot about it.

The birds that have cut the cords drip

down the glass. We wipe and wipe and drop our palms.

God has collected a dozen doll’s arms. In the drawer,

there’s even an old Korean textbook.

A white mouth, a black mouth. I parted my hair

and learned to ventriloquize

and earned this beautiful body.

On nights like this, I could count eyelashes.

If this night is God’s nightmare,

let’s wash the rags for us to wear and lie down a little while longer.

I dreamt that we turned our itchy backs

and took turns winding our springs, our breaths clouding the air,

and I grew so unbelievably close to belief

that I returned to the arms of a human.

by Lee Min-ha

Translated by Soeun Seo