Fire

I stared from the shadows at night, father,
as you slumped at the old pine table, head bowed,
quietly probing your soul.

Each evening, you would dust off a hard day's labor
and sink into the dining room chair and write --
pouring forth lifeblood in dark blue ink
across dim yellow pages, hazy green lines.

And the flame of your immersion into Art
cast an amber blanket over the corner
into which I had burrowed -- staring wide-eyed,
aching to touch the fire, to plow into your inferno,
but knowing, in the heart of hearts,
that my innocence would char and crumble
and dissipate, like chaff in the wind of hardened age.

And as days dissolved into months, and months, years,
so I was nurtured in the shade of quiet influence;
for, indeed, father, you spoke with your silence
as well as your tongue, words that crawled
into my mind and curled to sweet sleep,
words that lay bare the truth of our darkened hearts --
a shared secret passed on through shared blood.

Yet, you have tamed your beast, father, have set it afire;
you have found your Muse, awash in resplendence,
and only she can stay the desperate hand.
But I, father, am staked to the pyre,
bruised and bleeding, smothered in smoke,
aching for a fire -- a small sweet flame
to nurse my soul to sleep, staunch my dribbling wounds.

          Father, I no longer dwell in the dim corners of your
          brilliant blaze, in smoky haze; I am exposed and raw,
          trembling, seeking my own shelter --
          a wall to the wailing wind.

* 큰아들 James 가 아빠에게 드리는 시 ( U.C.Irvine에서
                                                            영문학 전공)
* 시 요약 해설 (정정선박사. 교수.시인)

* 아빠가 일을 끝내고 벽난로에 불을 지펴놓고, 소나무 책상에 앉아서 시를 쓸때,  타오르는 불빛을 바라 보면서,  자신은 핏줄로 아빠와 연결 되었음을 깨달았다는 내용으로, 불빛과 피를 연상적으로 아버지와 아들을 핏줄로 연결, 승화시킨 비약이 놀라운 시상의 일품이다.