Classic Poem

Alone, a young woman wept,
following the bier,
a procession without bells
or funeral banner.
Along the fog-shrouded, evening road,
phantom shadows.
The wind lifted tree leaves
on a street without doors or windows,
while others watched, hidden
behind phone poles or trees.
No one knew the name
of the one who had died,
that dark day,
with no moon rising.

We're gathered in the backroom of the co-op mill
playing cards for a dish of muk ;
it's market-day tomorrow. Chattering merchants
shake off the snow in the yard of the inn.
Fields and hills shine newly white, snow comes
swirling thickly down.
They talk about the price of rice and fertilizers,
about the local magistrate's daughter, a teacher.
It seems Puni, up in Seoul working as a maid,
is going to have a baby. Well, what shall we do?
Let's get drunk. The bar-girl
smells of cheap powder, still, let's have a sniff, eh?
We're the only ones who know our sorrows.
Shall we try raising fowls this year?
Winter nights are long, we eat muk ,
down drinks, argue over the water rates,
sing pop songs to the bar-girl's chop-stick beat,
and as we cross the barley field to make fun
of the newlywed man at the barber's shop,
look, the world's all white. Come on snow, drift high,
high as the roof, bury us deep.
Suppose we send a love letter, say,
to those girls behind the siren tower hiding
wrapped in their skirts? We're
the only ones who know our troubles.
Suppose we try fattening the pigs this year?