Korean Short Stories
Ra Heeduk Colloquy 對話 Translated by Kevin O'Rourke
Information This work was previously published in New Writing from Korea . Please contact the LTI Korea Library. library@klti.or.kr
About Ra Heeduk Ra Heedukk (1966~ ) was born and raised in a Korean orphanage where her parents— Christians who sought to carry out the teachings of their religion through communal living—served on the administrative staff. Na has confessed that the experience of living with orphans had made her a precocious child; and the recognition of the difference between herself and her playmates early on gave her a unique perspective on the world. Ra stumbled into the life of a poet quite unintentionally. While struggling between the religious ideals fostered by her parents and the causes upheld by the student movement she encountered in college, Na simply came to seek salvation in poetry.
LTI Korea eLibrary: http://library.klti.or.kr/node/121
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Colloquy Nothing exists except the ladybird and me; we both stole into this room to avoid the cold. The ladybird crawls laboriously along the floor, flails the air in upside-down collapse, sits abstractedly on the open page of a book, and - as if suddenly remembering unfolds its tail wings for a zing dusting. The zing of the wings cuts the heart like a tiny electric saw. Through the window winter sunlight illuminates the ladybird's dappled back. And when it also illuminates the eyes that are watching the ladybird's back, the inch worm within me addresses the ladybird within you. We're both a bit insect like; what colloquy can we share? An odour given off; a buzz as we circle each other; a joint flailing of the air as we get turned upside down; an idle stirring of pollen as we slither between pistil and stamen? What warmth can we - part insect as we are -
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share before we desiccate in a window nook? A handful of winter sunlight short as the stumpy tail of a roe. Copyright 2008 Literature Translation Institute of Korea
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