가을밤

Seo Dae-kyung

Artwork by Elizabeth Gabrielle Lee

어느 가을밤 나는 술집 화장실에서 원숭이를 토했다 차디찬 두 개의 손이 내 안에서 내 입을 벌렸고 그것은 곧 타일 바닥에 무거운 소리를 내며 떨어져내렸다 그것은 형광등 불빛을 받아 검게 번들거렸고 세면대 아래 배수관 기둥을 붙잡더니 거울이 부착된 벽면 위로 재빠르게 기어올라갔다 나는 술 깬 눈으로 온몸이 짧은 잿빛 털로 뒤덮이고 피처럼 붉은 눈을 가진 그 작은 짐승의 겁먹은 표정을 바라보았다 나는 외투 속에 원숭이를 품었다 그것은 꼬리를 감고 외투 속주머니 안에 얼굴을 파묻은 채 가늘게 몸을 떨었다

내 잔에 술을 채우던 사내가 놀란 눈으로 어디서 난 원숭이냐고 물었다 「구역질이 나서 토했더니 이 녀석이 나왔네」 나는 잘게 자른 오징어 조각을 원숭이의 손에 쥐여주었다 옆자리에 앉은 사내가 의미심장한 표정으로 천천히 고개를 끄덕였다 「가여운 짐승이군. 자네도 알다시피 그놈은 자네의 억압된 무의식의 외화된 형체일세」 「그렇겠지」 우리는 오징어 조각을 물어뜯고 있는 원숭이의 작은 주둥이 사이로 언뜻언뜻 드러나는 날카로운 송곳니를 말없이 지켜보았다 「저 이빨 좀 보게. 그리고 저 피처럼 붉은 눈을 보게. 겁먹은 듯 보이지만 저놈의 본성은 교활하고 잔인하지」 내게 술을 따르던 사내가 경멸 어린 표정으로 속삭였다 「물론 자네를 공격하려는 뜻으로 하는 말은 아닐세」 나는 씁쓸한 미소를 지으며 술잔을 비웠고 자리에서 일어섰다

나는 원숭이를 품에 안은 채 낙엽 깔린 가로수 길을 걸어갔다 밤하늘은 맑고 차가웠다 그것은 자꾸만 내 품속으로 파고들었고 고통스럽게 헐떡거리고 있었다 나는 속삭였다 「슬프고 고통스럽니?」 「응」 품속에서 원숭이의 힘없이 갈라지는 목소리가 들려왔다 「나는 너를 부인하고 너를 저주했지. 너를 때리고 너를 목 졸랐다. 하지만 넌 너 자신이 나의 억압된 무의식이 아니라는 걸 알고 있지」 「응」 「너는 죽고 싶니?」 「죽고 싶어」 「하지만 넌 나의 환상일 뿐이야」 「죽고 싶어」 나는 천천히 품속에서 온몸이 오그라든 채 떨고 있는 그것을 꺼냈다 그것의 짧은 잿빛 털 위로 가을의 가늘고 메마른 달빛이 눈부시게 반짝였다 「너는 누구니?」 「죽고 싶어」 작고 투명한 핏빛 눈동자가 나를 바라보며 속삭이고 있었다

Read the English translation

Seo Daekyung’s poem “Autumn Night” begins “One night in the fall I puked up a monkey. I was in the bathroom at a bar.” This leads to a quirky discussion between speaker and monkey, where the speaker tries to deny the authenticity of his own creation.

“I know I cursed and denied you. I hit you and I choked you. But you know, you are not my repressed unconscious.” “Yes.” “Do you want to die?” “I want to die.” “But you’re just an illusion I made.” “I want to die.”

When the speaker says “you are not my repressed unconscious,” we have a situation like the joke about the patient who, when asked by the psychoanalyst about the contents of their dream says, “I didn’t have sex with my mom.” The truth is revealed by denial of the truth. This is a microcosm of Seo Dae-kyung’s first book When the Idiot Feels the Atmosphere. The real is revealed by dreamscapes and fantasies. We arrive there by travelling through the obfuscation of truth and the make-believe. This is why I read Seo Dae-kyung’ speculative fiction as non-fiction. His works says to me something profound about the nature of (un)reality in Korea. Unlike K-pop groups like BTS which ask viewers to create their own meaning in displays of empty spectacle, offering a cheap and universal catharsis, contemporary poetry like Seo Dae-kyung’s capture the meaninglessness of a society obsessed with spectacle, communicating the anxiety and tension of what it is like to live in that world.  

—Jake Levine

Seo Dae-kyung was born in 1976. He studied English in college. He is the author of The Idiot Feels the Atmosphere.

Soeun Seo is a poet and translator from South Korea. Her translations have appeared at Hayden’s Ferry Review, Circumference, Puerto del Sol and more. Her original poems have been published at Hayden’s Ferry Review, Potluck Magazine, Witch Craft Magazine, and Fuck Art, Let’s Dance. She is currently a Michener fellow. She was a co-translator of Kim Yideum’s Hysteria (Action Books, 2019) and is currently working on a translation of Kim Min Jeong’s Beautiful and Useless which will be coming out in Spring 2020 with Black Ocean.

Jake Levine is an American translator, poet, and scholar. He received both his BA and MFA from the University of Arizona and is currently Abd in a PhD program in Comparative Literature at Seoul National University. He works as an assistant professor of creative writing at Keimyung University and as a lecturer at the Literature Translation Institute of Korea. He is the assistant editor at Acta Koreana and the editor for the Korean poetry series Moon Country at Black Ocean. Previously he served as the editor-in-chief of Sonora Review and as the poetry editor of Spork Press. His translation of Kim Kyung Ju’s poetry collection I Am a Season That Doesn’t Exist in the World (Black Ocean, 2016) was a finalist for ALTA’s Lucien Stryk Prize. Last spring saw the release of his co-translation of Kim Yideum’s Hysteria (Action Books) and a special collection of translations of Contemporary Korean Women Authors came out with Puerto Del Sol. His translations of Kim Kyung Ju’s poetry collection Whale and Vapor (Black Ocean) and verse-play Butterfly Sleep (Tupelo Press) are scheduled to be released in November.