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The Nation<br />
5<br />
Helen Han<br />
Losing<br />
I am two continents and three<br />
countries.<br />
Not always by free will<br />
have I moved from place to place.<br />
First I was dropped<br />
as a baby from the maternal<br />
month<br />
in the middle of North America.<br />
And for nineteen years<br />
I stayed.<br />
I stayed in a place<br />
where everybody tries to speak the<br />
same language.<br />
Adolescent tongue<br />
learned to form words<br />
about the common pool<br />
where people drop their pebbles<br />
and feel the weight of rocks,<br />
breakthrough.<br />
Korean was my first language<br />
and that country my first land.<br />
Before possession had a chance,<br />
the distance between there<br />
and here<br />
became like stone.<br />
Second language came easynow<br />
words,<br />
millions of letters in tandem<br />
pedal about me;<br />
my mind is a pole for these<br />
particles<br />
that tug with fervent energy.<br />
English has become a tool<br />
for navigation.<br />
In Jerusalem,<br />
English is my possesion.<br />
They walk the university pathsmy<br />
others.<br />
We sometimes bow our heads<br />
and always address each other<br />
formally.<br />
They remind me of a land<br />
that shows on my face.<br />
When I open my mouth<br />
words betray me<br />
as gyop-oh.<br />
I wonder what I have lost.
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