Poem That Ends at the Ocean/바다에서 끝나는 시
By Jim Moore/짐 무어
1
I’ve always wanted to write a poem that ends
at the ocean. How the poem gets there
doesn’t much matter, just so at last
it arrives. The manatee will be there
we saw all those years ago,
almost motionless under the water
like a pendant swaying at an invisible throat,
the one my mother used to wear
on the most special of occasions. My God
is still there, the one I prayed to as a boy:
he never answered, but that didn’t keep me
from calling out to him.
나는 늘 바다에서 끝을 맺는 시를 쓰고 싶었다.
그 시가 어떻게 바다로 가는지는 별로 중요하지 않고,
다만 마지막에 바다에 도착만 하면 된다.
2
I turn off the notification app for good,
no longer needing to know exactly how many gone.
After all, clinging to life
is what we have always done best.
We are still trying to hide
from the truth of things and who
can blame us.
Lists don’t make sense anymore,
unless toilet paper and peanut butter head them.
Last-stage patients are not being told
how crowded the ferry will be
that will take them across the river.
나는 알림 앱을 아주 꺼 버렸다,
정확하게 몇 명이 세상을 떠났는지 알 필요가 없기에.
3
We are forbidden cafés, churches, even cemeteries.
Fishing by ourselves, however, is still permitted. As long
as we keep nothing at all. As long as we walk
back home, in darkness, empty-handed,
breathing deeply, having thrown back
what was never ours to keep.
우리는 금지된 카페, 교회, 심지어 묘지이다.
한글 번역: Nanch Helen Kim©
(한글 번역은 잠시 후 내립니다.)
