Thursday, June 4, 2015

Crone Poem

ajumma

i’ve stopped bleeding and i can’t see
standing in a rush hour train
i break into spontaneous sweats
a heat source to all my neighbors

everything is dropping rapidly
as my muscles lose their earth element
i am loosening my hold on the physical
my memory is failing me
i find white hairs in my food

i burp snore and fart and queef
like a wind instrument 
everything is looser and more vaporous 
a mix of air and ether
ap and akasha
pitta fanned into vata

i embrace my ajumma status
and after a brief pretense of politeness
i gladly accept the seat the haksaeng offers me
then pull out my sewing
surrounded by smartphones
i pull slender steel through calico
making crooked lines of tiny stitches

everyday i inch closer to my transcendent self
the wise woman i can only hope to grow into
i am the age of my mother
when katja was born

i am fascinated by my aging skin
settling into grooves 
making rivulets and tributaries
i can stretch further and deeper with discernment
brave the uncharted
be less afraid to fail

unlike the young women 
click clicking through the streets of seoul in their heels
with so much at stake
bearing december wind on stocking legs
and checking themselves out in shop windows
i have nothing to show off
nothing to prove

i don’t bleed
i can’t see
i am so beyond shame i am dangerous
i’ve only just begun


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