한국에선 내 생각이 한국말로 들린다.잊어버린 목소리가 나를 찾고 있는 느낌이다. 잊어버린 사람이 나를 찾고 있는 것만 같다.
In Korea, I hear my thoughts in Korean. It feels as if a forgotten voice is looking for me. It feels like a forgotten person is looking for me.

엄마는 항상 나의 이름을 부르셨다. 서형! Diana!
Umma always called me by my name. SeoHyung! Diana!

Returning to New York after being across the ocean for two weeks, I head over to pick up Mark from school. Anticipating his joy at the sight of me, my stride is quick and light. Becoming a parent has rekindled my relationship to the notion of surprise. It began with his first flurry of laughter at a game of peekaboo, to his widened pupils when he took a bite of something pleasing to his palate, to the rush of excitement of waking up to snow.

I hand over my phone with a QR code that shows clearance to fetch Mark, and the school aid calls out with a microphone that alerts kids waiting in the auditorium: “Mark S.! Mark S.!” At this point, my shoulders feel tense and the back of my tongue is heavy as I hold back a squeal. I see him, sky-blue Carhartt beanie that we bought together at TJ Maxx and his gray jacket that he first hated (“Gray isn’t even a color, Mama!”) hanging over his shoulders. Tension releases as I see him and I yell out, “Mark!”

Mark looks straight through me with no discernible change in expression, exclaiming “Dad!” as he walks past me to find his father who is a couple of feet behind me. My heart drops. His father, noticing my letdown, says to him: “Mark, Mama is here!” After a pause, Mark hobbles toward me saying, “Hi, Mama.” We embrace, and he holds my hand while skipping the rest of the way home. While skipping, he turns his head to say to me, “You were gone for so long, Mama.”

엄마가 많이 아프셨을 때, 내 머릿속에서 계속 맴돌던 질문이 있다. “엄마, 내가 얼마나 엄마를 사랑하는지 알아?” 엄마께 꼭 여쭤보고 싶었다. 그리고 꼭 한국말로 여쭤보고 싶었다. 우리를 모르는 사람들은 내가 엄마에게 진짜 묻는 것이라 생각하지 않았을 것이다. 단지 질문처럼 들리는, 엄마를 향한 사랑 고백정도로 생각했을 것이다. 하지만 나는 진심으로 물어보고 싶었다. 그리고 엄마의 대답을 듣고 싶었다.
When Umma was very sick, there was a question that kept going through my head. “Umma, do you know how much I love you?” I really wanted to ask Umma. And I really wanted to ask her in Korean. People who don’t know us probably wouldn’t think I really wanted to ask her. They would have thought it was just a confession of love for my mother in the form of a question. But I really wanted to ask. And I wanted to hear Umma’s response.

A friend asks me how my reunion with Mark went, since they know that after a long time away, I am anxious to see him again. I tell them about the encounter between Mark, his father, and me. It seems they can’t help themselves but point out, “Hard to get, just like his Mama, huh?” I want to protest, but I hold back, as I have been known to avoid those I most long for—longing as a sensation is something I experience as intolerable, and avoidance keeps me from confronting the intensity of my own feelings. “I guess,” I reply.

Sleight-of-hand trick I perform for Mark to not call me “Umma”: When family or friends who speak Korean refer to me as his Umma, I would subtly replace it with “Mama.” “Mark, you are just like your Umma!” they would say. I would then respond, “Yes, you are just like your Mama.” Soon, no one called me his Umma. I want “Umma” to belong only to my mom. I am not ready to part with that name.
찬우가 나를 “엄마” 라 부르지 않게 나는 슬며시 재주를 부린다. 한국어로 말하는 가족들과 친구들이 나를 엄마라고 부르면, 나는 그들이 눈치채지 못하게“Mama”로 바꾼다.“찬우는 엄마 닮았네!”하면, “맞아, 우리 찬우는 Mama 랑 똑같아”라고 받아 친다. 사람들은 더 이상 나를 찬우 엄마라고 부르지 않았다. 오직 우리 엄마만 엄마였으면 해서 그랬다. 그 호칭과 작별하기 싫다.

Perhaps I had an undiagnosed case of postpartum depression, but as a new mom, dread came over me like darkness filling up my insides whenever it was time to put Mark to sleep. It was not because I found the task difficult, or that Mark was a fussy sleeper, or because I was so tired that everything was overwhelming. It was a psychic fear of putting a baby to sleep, leading him to unconsciousness, a reminder of death. It seemed to me that he had only been alive for so long, he barely seemed to exist. To keep needing to put him down was frightening.

Mark was rubbing his eyes or ears, signaling sleepiness, so I begrudgingly proceeded to swaddle then rock him in my arms. Feigning routine, I clumsily did all those things without conviction. As I rocked him, my feigned mothering became more convincing. If a stranger had been spying on me, they might have mistaken me for a seasoned caretaker. Much awaited unthinking was beginning to come upon me, and I was whispering to him, or thinking in my head, “Mark, I love you so much.” My love for him felt like a given, not needing practice or thought. As he was looking up at me, I realized, it is not I who love him and he, an unknowing, unappreciative recipient of my love. It dawned on me then—children are born loving their mothers.

자주 꾸는 악몽이 있다.누군가와 이야기를 나누는데 내가 대답을 하려고 하면 목소리가 안 나온다. 나는 계속 말하려고 한다. 목에 아무리 힘을 주어도 소리는 잘 나오지 않는다. 소리를 아예 내지 못하는 것보다 더 괴롭다. 조금만 더 힘을 주면 말이 나올 것만 같아서 포기하지 못한다.
There is a nightmare that I often have. I’m talking to someone and when I try to answer, my voice doesn’t come out. I keep trying to speak. No matter how much pressure I put on my throat, not much sound comes out at all. It’s more miserable than not being able to make any sounds. I can’t give up because I feel like the words will come out if I just apply a little more force.

After my reunion with Mark, I don’t sleep well and I wake up with the first stanza of Kim Sowol’s poem “가는 길” on my mind. “그립다/말을 할까/하니 그리워.”

The poem offers the only blueprint I can think of for understanding the sensibility of Mark’s reaction to seeing me. It is not merely “playing hard to get.” I know that sometimes connection is closer to disconnection. And it is the most precious things or relationships that we don’t want to touch or be near. I reach out to a translator friend because somehow, I feel that if this poem can be perfectly translated, then perhaps I can absolve myself of the guilt of never asking my mom the question I wanted to ask her.

“Do you know who made the best translation of Kim Sowol’s ‘가는 길’?”

“I do not but if you share a copy of the original with me, I can try.”

가는 길

그립다
말을 할까
하니 그리워

그냥 갈까
그래도
다시 더 한번….

저 산에도 까마귀, 들에 까마귀,
서산에는 해 진다고
지저귑니다

앞 강물, 뒷 강물,
흐르는 물은
어서 따라 오라고 따라 가자고
흘러도 연달아 흐릅디다려

“Can you share some examples of translations you’ve seen?”

“The ones I found were awful, I don’t even know where they are anymore.”

I do not look for the poor translations I had seen before. I think about the first stanza.

그립다: I miss you.
But there is no “I” there; it describes a state of missing. 그립다 reminds me of 그린다, which would mean to draw. I don’t know if there is any relationship between the two or if it is a coincidence that the two sound similar. But because of their sonic closeness, I always related the idea of missing to the idea of drawing—to miss someone, you long for their image. But the image is not there, so to get closer to the image, you draw them. The drawing is like a tender caress of a lover’s face. You touch them, you draw them, because you miss them.

말을할까: Should I say it?
Referring to the previous line about missing, the speaker seems to be wondering whether to say the “it,” which is to say, “I miss you.” But that would be the case only if 그립다 and 말을할까 were on the same line. By itself, 말을할까means “should I speak” or “should I tell.” It is not only that the speaker is deciding whether to say “I miss you,” but that the line break makes me think about the decision to speak at all. 말을할까 by itself is devastating.

하니 그리워: Doing so, I miss you.
Doing what? This refers to the previous line of wondering whether to speak. The speaker is wondering whether to say, “I miss you,” and even that wondering, that self-struggle, is causing the missing to occur. I had always thought this poem was emblematic of the modernist mind of Kim Sowol, articulating that language shapes our experiences. But in this poem, it is this invisible wondering, but not just any wondering—a wondering to speak—that makes the narrator realize their longing.

A few hours later, I receive this message from my friend:

“Here’s a version I attempted just now—I tried to keep the syllable count.”

Decision to Leave / On Leaving / Leaving

I miss you
Should I say it / What should I say / To say so / Should I just say
When I miss you so / I already miss you / I’d be missing you

Should I just go
But to / Even so
See you once more, again….

The crows in those mountains, and the crows in those fields
They too call out to / They too call and call / How they call and call
The sun setting on western peaks.

Up and down the river
The flowing waters
Tell me to follow along, tell me to go on
The flowing, how it flows, flowing on and on.

“This part —‘하니 그리워’—can I ask you about your version of the translation? You wrote it as ‘when I miss you so’—but I thought it was that he was struggling with whether to say it or not, and even the thought of saying it makes him miss them so much.”

“Yes, I think that’s right—even just wondering whether to tell someone that you miss them already means you miss them? The wondering/dithering worsens the missing/longing. And makes the parting more painful? Really nuanced in such a short space—very casual and yet … it seems like Kim Sowol is hard to translate because of the musicality and sounds.”

“So many approaches.”

“And it’s interesting to see the choices people make.”

***

I went to visit the apartment I lived in before immigrating. 미국으로 이민 오기 바로 전에 살던 아파트를 찾아갔다. I had meant to go earlier to spend some time meandering around, but my morning appointment went longer so I lost my chance. 조금 일찍 가서 주변을 하루 종일 맴돌며 시간을 보내려 했는데, 아침 약속이 길어지는 바람에 시간을 놓쳐버렸다. I was going to take the subway but called a taxi because I wanted to find it more easily. 원래는 지하철을 타고 가 려했지만 그 아파트를 쉽게 찾고 싶은 마음에 택시를 불렀다. That was a wrong decision. 그건 잘못된 판단이었다. I had forgotten about Seoul traffic. 서울에 차가 많이 막힌다는 걸 잊고있던 것이다. As the taxi crawled slowly, I became anxious. 택시가 느리게 기어가는 동안 내 마음은 점점 조급 해졌다. I tried to calm down by listening to music. 음악을 들으면서 마음을 가라앉히려고 했다.

음 sound; (음악의 of music) note
음색 tone
음성 voice

Sun had set and the taxi went into an alleyway. I don’t know when, but I must’ve fallen asleep. I began waking up. 해는 지고 밤이 되어 택시는 어는 골목길로 접어들었고 나는 언제 잠든 지도 모른 채 잠에서 깨었다. An alleyway began coming into my sight line. It may sound like a lie, but it’s as if my body recalled this alleyway and beckoned me to immediately wake up. 그리고 골목길이 눈에 들어오자 정말 거짓말같이 내 온몸이 꼭 이 골목을 알아보고는 나를 깨우는 것 같았다. As if the driver noticed that I had recognized this alleyway, he asked me, “Would you like to get off here?” 내가 골목을 알아본 걸 눈치채셨는지, 택시기사님이 나에게 물으셨다. “여기서 내리시게요?”“Yes,” and I got out of the car. “네”하며 나는 차에서 내렸다.

As I follow up the alleyway, the apartment we lived in with Umma started appearing in my sight. 골목을 따라 올라가니 우리가 엄마랑 같이 살던 아파트가 서서히 눈에 들어오기 시작했다. I walked closer, up to the entrance. 더 가까이 문 앞까지 다가섰다.

As if I was letting out a sigh, a sound comes out of my throat:

한숨을 쉬듯 내 목에서 소리가 나온다:

“Umma.”

“엄마.”

I am grateful to poet and translator Stine An for speaking with me and for translating Kim Sowol’s “가는 길.” I am also grateful to curator and writer HoWon Kim for copyediting and providing guidance on my Korean text.