[Afternoon Poem] Yeongtong / Kim Yuni

The city where my younger sibling started a new household,

carrying a housewarming gift, I came out of Bundang Line station and read Yeongtong (靈通). A Chinese character useless if you don’t know it, Yeongtong Station. Spirit (靈) communicates (通). Even while listening to newlywed life stories, the word presses down on my mind.

Isn’t that wrong? There is a story of divorce in the Tang Dynasty. A man and woman named Wang Zhu and Cheon Rang loved each other. However, the father tried to marry off his daughter. That’s not right. Wang Zhu, sunk in despair, left for a distant place, and Cheon Rang came to the seaside to find him. So they became a couple in a foreign land. After time passed and they longed for their hometown, they returned to Xingzhou. The husband first visited his father-in-law and asked for forgiveness for leaving. But the father-in-law said, “Your daughter has been bedridden and unconscious since Wang Zhu left, what are you talking about?” It is said that Cheon Rang came looking for only the spirit, having abandoned the body.

If love means stepping forward even as a ghost,

how stubborn must be my spirit that cannot abandon me.

Feeling like a useless body left alone, that makes me upset again,

I gaze at myself and shut down my thoughts.

A body that dies and lives unknowingly, a body that lives with white hair and is dead.

Joy and sorrow are so intertwined.

My insides are an endlessly lonely tunnel.

I must have completely forgotten. Somehow the direction I’m going feels like farewell.

Isn’t that wrong? …… Isn’t it, sister?

A voice not unfamiliar,

The exit is somewhere.

■ The ghost story in the first stanza is “The Divorce Tale” by Jin Xianwu, a Tang Dynasty Chinese novella. A somewhat similar story is “Xie Xiao Qian” from “Yao Zai Zhi Yi” by Qing Dynasty writer Pu Songling. “Xie Xiao Qian” is the original work of the film “A Chinese Ghost Story” directed by Ching Siu-tung, starring Leslie Cheung and Joey Wong. Korea also has quite a few folktales where the living and the dead share a deep bond, with the story related to Choi Chi-won in “Sui Jeon” being representative. Anyway, “If love means stepping forward even as a ghost,” then “how stubborn must be my spirit that cannot abandon me.” Isn’t it rather strange and eerie that even though one loves, one cannot step forward? ? Poet Chaesangwoo

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.