Eugene, you say,
“You are beautiful. You are too beautiful to me.”
Because that admiration is the best you feel,
because those words have truth because of your love,
I am happy.
Silly me, I believe what you say,
forgetting my complex of being the ugly woman.
“My skin became translucent,
my eyes are moist,
my lips are soft in red.”
How happy it is to be a fool,
“I am beautiful!”
1967
Please don’t think,
a woman is noble animal.
Just like a pussy cat,
a woman becomes attached to
a man who feeds her every day
a man who caresses her always.
Because of that,
I loved you.
Because of that,
I left you.
Please don’t think
a woman is a noble animal.
1967
If you happen to face each other,
and you smile in spite of yourselves.
There is love right there.
1967
We all are attracted by the freshness of running water.
For that freshness, we scoop up the running water.
Yet, how difficult it is to maintain its freshness,
once we capture the running water.
1967
Water takes all sorts of forms.
Boiling hot water, frozen ice.
Running fresh water, dark damp swamp.
All are essentially nothing but water.
Love also takes all sorts of forms.
Passion of love, hatred in hurting.
Thoughtful concern, greed of possession.
All are born from the fountain of Love.
Human-beings can’t live without water nor Love.
Yet they also could be destroyed by either one of them.
“One who can rule water, can rule a country.”
If so,
“One who can rule Love, can rule its life.”
1967
While I was not aware of it,
I gradually have grown in my love for you,
like drops of water filling up a glass.
I was very thirsty. But I knew that was the forbidden water.
It was so painful to repress my desire,
So, I broke the glass.
A piece of broken glass pierced my throat.
The splash of water stained my shoes.
Craving for moisture,
I drank various drinks, plain water, orange juice, tea
and coffee.
But, all of them passed through my throat just to
inflame it more
In my restless sleep, I dreamed.
The cool dew drops of that glass,
that water moistened my throat —
“My love, whether I had drunk that water at that time,
or not,
I do love you any way.”
1967
For my best friend J
Everybody, please listen to me.
My younger brother was killed in Viet Nam.
It was about a year ago.
A little bit before Christmas,
the whole city was busy and noisy,
obsessed with being happy.
In the twilight, standing at our door,
stood a figure in uniform.
“Something happened to my brother,” I felt.
But, I thought he was just injured.
Heaven! It can’t be true. He must not be killed!
“Sis, be a babysitter to my sportswear, will you?”
It’s not even five months since he said that, and left.
The brand new Buddhist altar was set up for him.
The glitter of metallic ornaments hurt my crying eyes.
While we did not know how to overcome this sorrow,
we were attending the funeral ceremony.
The start and stripes, which had been covering the coffin,
was folded neatly by the hands of youths like my brother,
and handed to my father.
The colorful stars & stripes, in exchange for
my brother’s life,
how foreign it was in my father’s hands,
who barely speaks English.
In his attempt to control his sorrow,
my father was wearing smile on his pale cheeks.
But his hair, which became all white overnight,
betrayed his smile.
My mother totally collapsed from sorrow.
The furrow of grief carved at the time
are still on her forehead.
Since then, the blooming complexion faded away from
her face.
What have we done wrong that’s worth this sorrow?
Except to be honest and good-natured.
About ten years ago, we came to America.
Each of us made his own effort to adjust to this
new world.
My father has been working as a gardener.
My mother has been working as a seamstress.
We sisters and brother have finished college,
overcoming our handicaps in English.
My sister and I have just started working.
We bought our house on the hill in Santa Monica
where the ocean breeze brings peace and comfort.
We were starting to taste American life,
when my brother slipped away from this happiness.
Our humble happiness must be paid by the death of
my brother?
We came to America in order to lose my brother?
Everybody, listen to me!
My brother was killed in the Viet Nam war.
Young men who have the same blood as yours
are being killed like my brother.
Even in this moment,
now.
1967
If there is an obstacle in communication words,
the obstacle resides in communicators,
human beings, not in words.
1970
What is life?
Life is how to set homeostasis in our living, the fusion of
ourselves and the outer world.
1970
Beautiful, the word starts to breathe
only when it reflects in the sparkle of your eyes.
Lovely, the word starts to get warm
only when it rests under the flicker of your eyelash.
Pleasant, the word awakes to smile
only when it echoes your voice.
Joy, the word thrills in happiness
only when it hugs your body.
Oh! What a gorgeous creature the world now has.
Touched by the tip of your little fingers,
things in the world start to breathe.
6/1970
“How is your girl friend, Barry?”
‘Oh, I have a bunch of girl friends.’
“How many?”
‘A lot!’
“I know one of them.”
‘Who?’
“Andoria”
‘No, she is my cousin.’
“Then, are they your school friends?”
‘Not only that, I have one even in my house.
The one I am talking with.’
“Hehehehe…”
‘But you are not only one. I have eight girl friends.
But…I wish you are my mother.’
“I am your sister. No. I am your aunt.”
‘But you are not my real aunt.’
“That’s O.K. For playing. I am a little ant running here
and there. A little ant which will
eat up a delicious Barry.”
“He, hehehehe…”
6/8/1970
Happiness is like an enchanting fragrance
surrounding happy people.
Just being near them,
I feel as though I’m drunk on that scent.
Unhappiness is like an offensive odor.
With audacity, it steps on the soft fragrance.
This is why I become alone
when I am unhappy.
If I am too lonely,
I get near the happy people,
putting a lid on my unhappiness.
If I became very very happy,
I would dare to step into the midst of a bad odor—
as long as I could be confident
that I would keep emitting fragrance.
1967
I am a prism, a plain piece of glass.
Only when rays pierce through me,
I emit colorful breath.
When you piece through me,
I am dazzled by a rainbow arch
which I have never seen before
which I’ve never felt before
which I’ve never heard before.
I am a prism.
Only when rays pierce through me.
I discover what I am.
1970