Love is not
in a person who loves.
A person inside love
loves.
the remains of a flower caught
in the narrow neck of a vase
withers in the nasty smell at the bottom
while the flower is in yesterday’s sky.
LEE Seong-bok (b. 1952) was born in Sangju, Kyungsang Province. He graduated from Seoul National University, majoring in French literature. Poetry collections When Will the Rolling Stone Awake 1977), Namhae geumsan (1986), End of That Summer (1990), Your Suffering Cannot Turn One Single Leaf Green (2001), Ah, Mouthless Things (2003), Ripple Patterns on the Moon’s Forehead (2003). Vastly expanding the sphere of meaning to permit endless questions to be raised, his poetry makes us rethink of the fundamental relationship that lies beneath life. In his recent poetry book, Ah, Mouthless Things, the poet touches the beings and things existing on the fringe of the world in very sensitive words He. currently teaches French Language and Literature at Gyemyeong University.