Haeundae Beach
There is a full moon: De Bo
Rum.
The tide draws us to this place.
This night, the sky is lit by stars:
On this beach, we are lovers.
White waves roll into shore
wash fine sand under our feet
slowly, like an hour glass.
I will not remember the bad things
the rat on the bar room beam
backstreet cheap hotels
the alleys where sailors stumble
piss and puke in the night
the static blare of music.
The exhaust fumes are flown out to sea
On strong winds
which
blow and tangle fresh in
your hair.
This night is ours. There is only
the distant taste
of salt
on your
lips.
Haeundae is a 1.5km long beach in the eastern part of Busan, Korea. It takes its name from Haeundae takes its name from
ReplyDeleteHaeun ("Sea and Clouds"), the pen name of 9th-century scholar/poet Choi Chi-won, who admired the view from the beach and built a pavilion nearby. He engraved a piece of calligraphy on a rock there, which still exists. Among his few extant poems is one he composed on his way home after serving as an official in China:
I ask for the ferry that will take me across the river....
The traveler's road, rain falling upon the river;
My former home, dreaming of return, springtime beneath the sun.
Crossing the river I meet with fortune the broad waves.
I wash ten years of dust from my humble cap strings.
Though he was a noted Confucian scholar, he spent his final years in retirement at Haeinsa, a Buddhist temple on Mt. Gaya where his brother was abbot. His straw slippers were discovered at the edge of the forest there after he ascended into the heavens as a Daoist immortal.