5) Gone With the Wind

     Wolran Kim

 

My father was the wind

While someone says his father was a servant

While someone says his father was a communist

My father was the wind

 

Whenever he passed by, flowers were whirling

All the plants that don’t have roots, with a whoosh

Fell down with a scream

Whenever he passed by, my forehead was chilled

And an icicle hung from my eyes

 

If the world was shaking, it was him

When the sunlight shined

Lightened infants sat holding the walls tightly

Forming a little knot of togetherness

 

If mother kept muttering

The wind was blowing

If a chill was waving under the roof

It was a short gust of wind

 

It was a day without even a hint of wind

My mother became a dot, waiting for the wind

When the wind that was wandering wildly

Disappeared higher and higher

Riding a balloon

Mother, waiting as a dot, became the wind

 

I read, as written Gone With the Wind

I write, as read Living With the Wind*

 

* In Korean, ‘Gone’ and ‘Living’ are homophones.