["Not a chrysanthemum, and yet colours against the cement..." Foto Rb]
To bring one chrysanthemum
to flower, the cuckoo has
cried
since spring.
To bring one chrysanthemum
to bloom,
thunder has rolled
through the black clouds.
Flower, like my sister
returning
from distant, youthful
byways
of throat-tight longing
to stand by the mirror:
for your yellow petals to
open,
last night such a frost
fell,
and I did not sleep.
NOTA
Transl. David R. McCann, in: Selected Poems of Seo Jeong
Ju, New York, Colombia University Press, 1989, p. 20.
