One November morning outside Saratoga Springs
over coffee at the Red Roof Inn you say
Vivid snapshots cross my mind
like race cars crashing on a track
No! my voice shakes into a laugh
shocked by my own answer
Hurricane fists and broken glass…
I catch the danger in your eyes
Later: Eleven minutes, we’re leaving
and you slam the bathroom door
I grab your .38
from the nightstand drawer
where it lies next to Gideon’s Bible
nudge the door open
Shaving cream all over your face
like a mug shot of Santa without a hat
In our reflection
I’m pointing the gun
at the back of your head
For a moment
we’re young and silly again…
You think I’m pathetic
I give you a smile, then fire:
No more spaghetti sauce burning my skin
No more black eyes
No more 3 a.m. knife at my throat
No more broken nose after the football game
No more muffled screams
I didn’t plan to shoot you
five times
but the gun only had five bullets
Tanya Ko Hong (20th century) South Korea and USA
Source: La Bloga
Tanya Ko Hong is a bilingual poet and translator. You can find her at tanyakohong.com and on Instagram@tanyakohong. She was born in South Korea and lives in a bicoastal (LA & New York) in the USA. She has an MFA in poetry from Antioch University. Tanya is the author of four poetry collections, most recently The War Still Within: Poems of the Korean Diaspora (KYSO Flash Press, 2019),
No comments:
Post a Comment
Please keep your comments relevant and free from abusive language. Thank you. Note that comments are moderated so it may be a day or two before your comment is posted - irrelevant or abusive comments will not be published.