AFTER ALL

woke up this morning in a funk, half drunk. took a shower and made a pot of coffee. smoked a jazz cigarette, and a cigarette. listened to moscow: i know it's strange to think of you when reading about someone so confused, but i can barely keep my phone away. woke with much worry about dates and trips, bills and my will to do what i must do. walked out into a unexpectedly warm sunny day, a strong pleasing breeze blowing my hair and scarf playfully. then, suddenly, instantaneously, realize the truth: no need to worry. no need when i write. no need when i play music with ancient friends. no need when blown away by peers. no need when prospects, simple ones, the prophesy of hands to be held, cheeks to be kissed, parents to meet, quiet nights under dim lights speaking the same language to be shared, are thought of at work in a dim corner of the office with headphones in listening to jdutt, again, thinking of all this stuff, these things: just like with them we've parted ways, we've set those bridges all ablaze, but i still think we're the only sane ones left.

REPETITION IS AN EASY WAY OUT

so much holding of hands, even in the cold. and fall leaves fading slowly as winter creeps in and people pass by them briskly. so much anticipation for lists and checklists of gifts and resolutions. and much laughter. that is for sure. much warmth and cozy blanket mornings and late night listens to favorite songs remembering the wishes for snow days. so much love, and hating of loving. hating that loved ones are no longer here, cannot share in the joy of holding someone who has a part of you in them, in their dna, in their genes. but loving nontheless. and so much thought; thinking and hoping and worrying and exploring, traveling and conducting, playing and fighting, sexing and working, partying and finalizing, trivializing and flying, scrabbling and gwaving, listening, feeling, feeling, feeling, feeling.

YOUR HANDS BELONG IN FLORIDA

it's painful to think that i am alone, again.

in the airport i miss my niece, obviously.

i miss my mom and dad, my sister patty and glenn.

i miss kimchi smell in the mornings,

sweaty feet at night from the florida humidity,

i miss stories told at the dinner table that i had never known:

your grandfather was a wrestler and went semi-pro;

i once ate raw rice for two weeks straight when i crossed over what is now the demilitarized zone;

my best friend died in philadelphia the day you were born;

now all we talk about is how my grandparents are gone

and that i should quit smoking

instead of the fact that i really will miss the ocean and

the clouds which wisp along across the horizon,

and the sun particular to the south.

i miss listening to songs that i never listened to anywhere else.

i miss the awkward hugs.

i miss warm hands sweaty hands with which i typed early in the morning with so much to write

right now,

i miss having the feeling of missing something,

somewhere,

someone.

IN A HOUSEBOAT I'LL BE WAITING

she will probably be late; will arrive 23 minutes after schedule, in a haste, hair shuffled and shoulder in slight pain from the weight of cigarettes and poetry in her purse. i will have checked my watch 32 times, re-read the text which stated i will be there, babe, 18 times. skipped 29 rocks into the lake.

she will be wearing black tights and boots. will have cute, black overalls. a scarf and a white blouse. a creme colored crocheted cap; gloves, large sunglasses, a coffee, a half-smoked cig ashed violently by a howling wind. she will be wearing dark red lipstick, will have a smile on her face.

she will say sorry for being late, for making me wait so long. will give me a hug - deep surprising hug. will smell of two bodies in bed on an autumn evening while the rhythm of pitter pattering rain explains the word love. she will want to talk to me for hours, even will, much later, hide the fact that she cannot keep her eyes open, hide the fact that she would only sleep if she could be with me.

she will touch my arm. she will laugh too loud at something dumb i said. she will stare without blinking deep in my eye when i am looking at a bird up high perched in a tree. she will lay her head on my chest as we lay back and guess what the animals in the clouds are thinking. she will ask how are you? are you happy? she will make me feel as if i am half asleep.

she will make of this moment what she wants: to be, fully and completely, loved.

and i can do that for her. i want to do that for her. i am waiting, waiting, waiting, waiting; for her.

THIS WORD WAS A 70+ PT SCRABBLE WORD IN A GAME THAT HAPPENED SOMETIME AND SOMEPLACE: INFINITE

when i approach this man who is very much like myself i may greet him with a 'hello.' i may say, 'how are you.' perhaps, "how's your day" is the best. maybe i offer him a glass of water. i may give him a hug, and i might cry a little bit after. i might ask how she is, if her hair has turned silver metallic. i might simply laugh at the sight of him but not in a degrading way, a laugh of pure joy. i don't know - i could, maybe even for some reason, perhaps if the season is winter and we are stranded on the side of the road in the midst of a blizzard on the outskirts of cold boulder, having to change a flat tire, be upset.

maybe i'd say nothing. just stare. crazy twilight stare.

maybe, just maybe, i'd ask him a random ass question: how many times have you shit today? do you piss in swimming pools? showers? what did you REALLY think of twilight? what do you do when you are alone at home? how many people have you seen die, right in front of your eyes? when you were 24, what did you think was in store for you? has it come true? should i abandon all hope?

one could also easily imagine that i'd immediately suggest, off the bat, minute i see his face, that we play a game of scrabble.

maybe i tell him a story about a memory that he was apart of, but isn't really his; i mean, i was the one who lived it, so it's mine, right? it'd be about a day in september when we were at my sister's home with daly. i'd say dad, remember when we were at sis's (my sister won't let me call her patty) for my birthday awhile back. we ate sushi and talked about tiger woods and golf and graduate school (the only things we ever talk about)? you fell asleep on the couch. i was hanging with daly and she was walking around and then she walked up to you and kind of played with your socks and kept trying to pull them off. classic dad socks, smooth, velvety black socks (i did read/play pat the bunny with daly when i babysat her so she has an affinity for touching). anyway, it made me want to cry. i don't know why but we were all there, three generations of kims." then i'd probably pause because he doesn't really understand english all too well. let him digest the information. "yeah, so, anyway. i just want to tell you that you must want to know what it's like to be a korean in america who got to grow up here. and i want to tell you. but there's too much, just like you probably can't tell me everything about your life. and i imagine that's why we have an unwritten understanding that there is not much to be said. we know what's up, and it's all good, and we appreciate, and know without having to hear any words. all i want to say is you are the patriarch now dad. when grandma and grandpa died, you became the head of the household. and then i look around at everything sis and i have, and now daly, and i have to say, good job old man. and you know, i'm pretty scared to become the head of the household someday; i'm scared of losing you."

i may make him come with me to the corn field back home where my friends and i used to smoke copious amounts of drugs, drink and play guitar under crystalline icy skies in the fall; where i lost my virginity, where i had my first break up, my first kiss. i would make him lay down on a blanket and tilt his head backward to look at the world upside down, to see the sands of stars. i would make him promise to listen to pavement and read william faulkner and my own writing. i would make him talk about sex and drugs and love and heartbreak and holding hands and the most arrogant thoughts and the most debased thoughts he'd ever thought of. i would make him tell me all the thoughts hidden deep down, never even attempted to be put into words, he'd ever had ever in his entire life. i would make him expose himself, answer my questions, my demands to know the truths - to know the truths about me, myself, and who i am.

i would make him, i would make him; i would make him.

EXCESS

write too much. awake too much. love too much. wish for cuddles too much. lend myself to people's trouble too much. watch pbs too much. eat bad food too much. drink too much, smoke too much. categorize too much. judge too much. want to own people too much. want people too much. overanalyze too much. want to talk to her too much. want her to talk to me too much. wish for things to be different too much. criticize too much. think too much, philosophize too much. forget too much. say too much. feel too much. see too much.

am too much.

too much wishing to be something i am not yet. too much wanting to be with someone i am not with yet.

too much, too much.

too much life for my languishing, weakening, terrified body.

TWILIGHT

why do people like twilight?

because two people love each other without any explanation. do things for each other for no reason. meet for a day and are instantly connected. would die for each other. would blame themselves rather than the person they love. because he would change his monster heart, and she would change her entire being, for love. for the fact of divorced families of normal everyday people, and happy and loving families of outcasts. because of white lies aimed to protect.

because of the moment we anticipate and wait for patiently until it happens and it is two people in embrace, when all is laid bare, with sneaky sniffs of and shaky fingers through the hair, the kissing of noses and cheeks, of the weak knees and butterflies in the stomach, because in those moments it doesn't matter if the love doesn't make sense, or is intellectual, thoughtful, provoking, meaningful, logical, sensical.

because love is none of those things. because love does not, will not ever, make much sense, at all.

PERHAPS

... i am nocturnal because in my body the blood which flows knows that home is not here, it is in korea. and so day is night and night is day. it may sound outlandish, but i just can't escape the blood in my veins, the spirit of my ancestors which makes my nights strange. it does not just up and go. doesn't when i look in the mirror, or try to say 'rural', or eat a big mac at mcdonalds with my parents. certainly doesn't when i am called a chink walking home from the bar.

so of course i would be up now, at 3am, wide awake as if it were the middle of the day. no, i am supposed to be at the doctor for a 4pm appointment instead of being in columbus, oh twelve hours earlier writing in front of my computer with a chestache. my parents should have never left. should have realized how hard it is to adjust and no, not to the culture, to the time: i am always ahead, feel ahead, feel as if i was lead here against my will and my body is telling me that i am not in the right place. it is obviously why my mind will race at the wrong time of the day, and i cannot sleep, cannot dream of beautiful things. cannot meet her out at the east bank of the stream; cannot skip rocks into the moss-covered electric machine; cannot not speak and hear, nonetheless, everything.

a shame but it can happen often, when nocturnal; goodnight moons are said too soon. before you know it the sun is up and the sky is maroon, and birds are chirping, and cars are honking in traffic, and children wait at the bus stop with sesame street umbrellas and yellow duck rain boots. but even then, when said too soon, my body knows that back home the land where my spirit was born, it will always be a true goodnight moon.

UNTITLED (WHAT I'M THANKFUL FOR)

not the pumpkin pie, not the turkey, not the cranberry sauce, not the stuffing, not the rice, not the gravy, not the beer, not the wine, not the smell of it all, the smell of grandma's cooking, not the smell of grandma herself, not the scent of her hair or mother's, not the smell of sweat both the women and the men, not the tablecloth, not the special forks and spoons, not the beautiful wine glasses that tattered tablecloth under the expensive chandelier, not the pretty blouse your mom wears which she will dirty later, not the rings on her fingers or the way she laughs, and not the way dad grumbles and stretches out like a fat cat, lying next to the window as the sunlight pours in generously, not the sounds of the doorbells and beeps of cars as they lock, not the doors that open and close with a creak, not the music, not the crinkle of clothes on clothes during extended and close hugs, not the sighs, not the smiles, not the drive home along the highways of ohio, not the mass of dead trees that lay on the high hills, not a heavenly sunset that chills the skin, not shaky fingers while writing, not colors, not taste, not scent, not visions, not feelings, not thanksgiving, not words or meanings, not sense, not nonsense, not logic, not reason, not science, not god, just the moment when all you can think of and feel and believe and utter under a soft gasping breath is the word life

ROMANCE

"Always running and always wanting to go back but always being farther and farther away until finally it was just a scene in a movie where a girl says hello into the cauldron of the world and you are just a woman watching the movie with her husband on the couch and his legs are across your lap and you have to go to the bathroom. There were things of this general scale to cry about. But the biggest reason to cry was to drench the air in front of our faces."

- Miranda July, What is Romance

AM I COOL

a questioning culture is what i would like for us to be. then people would realize that no one really has any answers at all. the world wouldn't mind if you were an aimless traveler, a human without a home; we would all recognize it in each other. we'd hitch hike to Albuquerque or Denver and rummage through a dusty dumpster on the side of the highway in the desert, or kick an old tomato soup can around with our feet and boots in the snow. i would remember that it is November 16th and i would get you to smoke a pack of cigarettes with me through a simple smile or a laugh or a longing look in the eye. then, we watch a meteor shower and drink whiskey and take photos with our phones-

which reminds me, you know when you move a camera real fast and snap the shot, the pictures come out and there are fantastic streaks of light which sometimes zig-zag or are beams or light rays or precise lines which are all blurry but sometimes more aesthetically pleasing than the actual image itself, or the actual moment of the image? like streaks of light emanating from the boyfriend or pockets the kitten or the weeping willow in bloom on a rainy sunny day outside grandma's house.

well, i think that is very much like a meteor shower.

it could be a prerequisite to be chilly when viewing the meteors. so you can have someone close to warm you. for the opportunity of embrace. so you can meld with him and the moment, and the stars, and yes, the crickets and the air, crickets and air.

SUBLIME

this is a night writers dream of. and a cigarette that even people who don't smoke would relish. it is shadows of raccoons who scrounge the dumpsters for scraps, and parting couples in the early morning while the dew is on the grass, at the airport, sending their loved one soldier off to some foreign country with a hug and kiss and a picture of their daughter dressed as a fuzzy duck on halloween. this is the kind of time when the moon has a haze and is bright, and halved, and prompts me to think of the 'other' half.

all kinds of thought arrives in these moments; of happy times, when life hands its best hand to you, and you are mostly assured but confused as to what to do. what to do with such responsibility. what to make of success and its burden, of the pressure to live up to whatever it is that determines glory and greatness. what to do with words that jumble and become mumbles after too many drinks and smokes on a third story porch when then moon hangs low and ...

SNAPSHOTS

FEBRUARY 20 2005

I wake up blue after a late night-early morning nap at 5:45 AM when everything is a shadow and electric light from the television screen flickers throughout the room. I sit up in bed and put on a shirt and some shorts and wrap a blanket around me like toga. Then I rub the goop from out of my eyes and put on my glasses to read some text scrolling across the bottom of the screen: CNN BREAKING NEWS - HUNTER S. THOMPSON SUICIDE CONFIRMED.

Before I took my nap vague details began to appear but nothing was final. Now that it has become fact, etched into the history books, validated by reluctant voices of family members at numerous press conferences, I cannot help but contemplate the self-determined act, wonder what he felt at the precise moment of exodus. What did you hear then, Hunter? What did you see, or taste, or smell?

What happens when the spirit is ripped from its shell?

I think that death would be much like an adventure to a carnival where the normal and bizarre converge into one; images cease to make sense, pleasure and disgust blend together, what is human and what is Nature completely indistinguishable from each other.

Hunchback and twisting my body to avoid intermittent breezes, I walk out into the dawn and attempt to light a cigarette. Since it is extremely cold I try to remember Henry David Thoreau and his winter walk, how he would hike in the bitter chill past a frozen Walden Pond, how he could imagine a fire rage within his body, deep in his spirit, enabling him to feel warm, as if he were at home in front of the fireplace. For me, at this moment, it is nearly impossible to warm myself through such deliberate thought, especially as a negative fifteen degree wind collides with my face.

Shy clouds sift soft snowflakes all around me which melt and pass away upon contact with my skin; the construction hums and early-bird bums mine dumpsters for scraps and I do not feel, to be honest, normal at all. The moon hangs around for a bit and it is gorgeous and I think to myself i would like to be up more often at dawn when the moon is up and the sun is up and it is in between night and day and it is night and day at the same time. But soon the moon which was once there is now absent and I think of Hunter, and myself, and look out into the desolate empty streets filled with the orange haze of streetlamps and look across to other apartments and homes where all the lonely folk, disparate and cold, sleep in their comfort, utterly deprived.

NOVEMBER 23 2004

WHAT I WILL MISS MOST ABOUT LIFE:

Definitely Thanksgiving, the smell of it all, the smell of grandma's cooking, scent of her perfume and her white crispy hair; the same tattered checkered tablecloth, the special forks and spoons, the beautiful wine glasses which twinkle under the expensive chandelier; the crème colored apron my mother dirties every year, and the jade and gold rings on her torn and battered fingers; and especially, her hearty laugh; the sound of the doorbell and the beeps of mini-vans as they lock; other familiar doors that open and close with a creak; the piano and banjo and the sound of clothes crinkling upon clothes between close and extended hugs; the sighs, the smiles, the cries; the unheard tune sung by someone at a red-light which is viewed through the rear-view mirror; pop rocks and Rubiks cubes and wrist clocks and roller coasters and hot apple cider on a snow day, funnel cakes and bicycle rides with no hands; watching marshmallows melt into hot chocolate; swimming out to the breakers on the lake; the way a tack moves into drywall as it is pushed in; acting pretentious at a coffee-shop porch melting in an afternoon summer sun, a novel with a broken spine next to a lit cigarette burning in the ashtray by the side; fingers which shake uncontrollably between pauses when writing; but most of all the writing: to write and write kept going by the chirps of birds and the reassuring knowledge that there will be early morning dew on the grass; and then the reading of what was written and not even knowing of what it meant or how it was even written at all.

FEBRUARY 20 2006

On the anniversary of Hunter’s death I have no woman, no real job; I live with my brother and his second wife. My infant niece cries in the room next door and wakes me up every night. But I still enjoy writing.

No; I depend on the writing to exist. But I’m not making any money from it; and I’m depressed, almost never sober, cold and hardened and I think often on it – how he closed his eyes, placed the chill metal nozzle, fit it in the soft area under his chin, locked it in place with the pressure of the shotgun pushing against the lower jaw, took in a long, extended breath of dank cabin air, pulled the trigger and then, the white.

CHECK LIST:
1 – Ask a woman if I can get into her pants so as to receive a painful slap across the face. And, hopefully it leaves a mark.
2 – Brand myself with dots through the putting-out of cigarettes on my arm.
3 – Write a poem on a piece of sharp paper and cut the inside webby parts of my fingers and toes.

The checklist will be here to remind of what transpired on that wintery night, that heroic deed; of the snow which fell light like confetti, and the lone sounds of pine tree boughs bending and creaking under the burden of the snow, and of owl’s hoots, and shrieks of mice as talons punctured soft, furry skin; and the sound of the shot rippling through nerves; the tear of flesh and crack of bone—the penetration and blood which birthed a new life.

UNTITLED

running with it even as
the sauce is spilling even
while a guy is pouring
beers in a procession of
neon cars yes candy

runts and human runts
are bouncing in boxes
making click noises and
the mountain theres always
the mountain and free will

to violate traffic law or fry
some eggs in a crooked
skillet hands floppy yolk
wobbly the sun feels hot
on the right cheek my lips

feel dry plaid shirts
are hanging on the line I’ll
have to bring them inside
I ran into an electric fence
looking for my toothbrush

thats a true story just like
when the wind picked a
wine glass up off the
tiled table it popped into
pieces in the air in space

Jane Shim, UPenn 11'

LIFE

I figure that worry is pretty unproductive. In some cases, it is good, but most of the time people are restricted by it. They get nervous, or plan so much for the future, or are anxious for something. There's a difference between worrying because you want to do well, and worrying because you think you don't have the ability.

Why is love so important to the matter? It has to do with love as an abstraction that is social, not just individual. Love that goes two-ways, and is dependent, not independent. Once at a Christian retreat I learned that you can't really love an object. People 'love' objects, but they really like them. Or, rather, real love is reserved for sentient beings. For instance: I love this hat a lot. I love this beer a little. I love Turbodog more than anything. That's not true love because love doesn't come in degrees. That's 'like.'

My point is, when someone else is having a problem, a person you 'love,' that you don't want to see upset, let's say a friend who you've known and respected and admired for awhile - what does one do? Well one begins to comfort the other person, I would hope. And in those moments of comforting doesn't one usually look for and suggest alternatives, positive alternatives, fantastic outcomes, strategies to change the topic or lighten the mood, say things that are wonderful and great, help, maybe even physically, with whatever situation is at hand.

Anyway. What happens when people begin to face problems of their own?. I think, sometimes people get themselves into trouble, get themselves into an even more upset and angry and sad and whatever emotional, negative state, simply because they forget about the fact that love is two-ways. In a way it's selfish, and in a way it's not.

Let me elaborate.

It is a selfish thing to continue to be upset and continue to worry. Why? Because remember, a person who loves and wants to help someone else would do all the things I suggested up there, and would find perhaps even more inventive and creative ways to ameliorate the pain, assuage the nerves, you get my point.

Point is, if you loved yourself, you would do the same exact thing for yourself. (That's where it's not selfish). So if you help and make another person feel better during times of stress, then you should realize that you, yourself, are made up of lots of different people, and so loving yourself, as selfish as it seems, should mean you comfort yourself and do the things you'd do for someone else for yourself. Surely it is hard and produces doubts, but it is a good way to live, I think.

Doesn't that seem logical?

FILLMORE JIVE

instead of being up and awake at four in the morning while a monsoon rain rakes against my windowpane, while i rummage through luggage and suitcases filled with album after album of old family photos, i need to sleep. rather than impossibly yearn to go back in time to the precise moment captured in the particular photo i hold in my shaky hands, of my father when he was ten years old, a stone faced boy in a navy blue school uniform with a cold smile sitting on the steps of a temple in North Korea, i need to be comfortable and cozy, dozing off to dream of snacking on Klondike bars and playing guitar in a fort with a golden retriever who smokes cigarettes and plays the bass.

i would like to not be nostalgic – to not have this deep desire to get dirty and dig into the depths of time, to infiltrate history, to be transposed to the precise moment my father prepared for the snapshot and squinted from the flash of the camera. i cannot help it though; i want to know him then, know what he thought of when he woke up and felt a chilly breeze blow in from the window, when he would dip his legs into a cool lake on a summer day, when he laid on dewy grass in the morning staring up into the clouds. i want to have known him before he gave me a name, before, on lonely days, i would drive in the snow on the back-roads of Ohio forgetting to relish in the beauty of winter because the darkness of my mind put me in a slumber; before i read a poem that told me that we learn the most from what's fallen. he would not have known then, in that moment in 1953, as boundaries were drawn across the land, that one day i would figure out that all life is is an imprint on my brain of a hummingbird who came by to say hello as i rainbow-watched and smoked a cigarette; that would have been before another day of gray sky, when i would happen upon a couple of teary-eyed folk in embrace kneeling in front of a grave and would find myself in wonder and want to feel and know the depths of their anguish, and the reason for their pain; before i would take long walks along the beach for a good while, a mile or two, thinking of all of the lonely aimless souls who walk as well, wondering under the chandelier of night, asking themselves quietly under their breath, how many children want for the love of someone else?

i'd like to sleep but for some reason i can't, not even when i try to meditate. i will try to sleep soon and want to sleep soon and will give up this fantastic idea of transportation to another time and place because it is impossible to actually time-travel – and if i could, i don’t think i would be able to change anything because if i did the photo would not exist in the same manner in the future, and would not have inspired this insomniac state. so i do not wish to go back, after all; i do not wish to change the past—would not even for the chance to see pavement reunite. i just need to sleep.

but i am writing now, instead of searching, rather than sleeping. i write because to write is to be in a kind of sleep; it is free like a dream; you can write whatever and it all has meaning (or none at all). instead of being awake rummaging through paper memories i will write and it will suffice—it is nearly better than sleep.

SUNRISE, SUNSET

wake up in the morning and tell yourself that life is beautiful and it is a new day and although it is a cliche remember that the potential for new things to happen is always around us so take advantage of it, tell someone you think their hair looks nice or that their shoes are cute or that you like their laugh or just smile and let your eyes do the talking. it is good to simply wake up and smell the coffee and know with full confidence that the day you are about to experience has never been experienced by anyone, and has not been planned, and cannot be predicted or determined - at least not wholly and completely. so, who knows, perhaps you will meet someone today who will change your life, or read a poem that makes you feel more than you've ever felt before, or simply find yourself lost for a second or two in the most peaceful state you've ever been in. all that is possible because life is not over at all, it has just begun.

UNTITLED

families are minor keys like Ramadan and honesty is powerful it crumbles like rusks
it sticks like hitchhiker skin just having some laughs during backlit dinners
dusty flat feet deserted and hiding thin wrists under medium weight jackets
lagging speech hesitating in ritardandos which are just that beautiful


letters are pieces peeling tumbling like pumpkins and bobbing like puppets
last year I saw you sit in filtered sunshine the room was like a cave but you
inspired it with flowers once I exchanged email addresses with a complete stranger
who intimidated me I didn’t like it and wished he was still bent and blooming


conviction it settles in an instant in the time it takes hangnails to bleed
in the time it takes to try honesty in the time it takes to go to school and come home
arched eyebrows like bird feathers from the rump while Satchmo’s lips buzz
anxious and psycho just please no more lists or anger or any of that teeth clenching business


only when we are alone and leaning real far away from yellow clouds
I didn’t miss it when you moved away just scratched my chin and slouched a little in my chair

JANE SHIM, UPenn 11'

NATURE

Chiura Obata

There are worlds of experience beyond the world of the aggressive man, beyond history, and beyond science. The moods and qualities of nature and the revelations of great art are equally difficult to define; we can grasp them only in the depths of our perceptive spirit. - Ansel Adams

PUNK IN THE BEERLIGHT

Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec said it best: “One should never meet a man whose work one admires. The man is always so much less than the work.”