A single strand of light slips through the door,
painting the ceiling with its quiet gold.

Before the appointed time,
I stand at the crossroads—
not knowing which path to take,
or which to abandon.

“I have come at last.
All is ready—
today, not tomorrow.”

Today—the day I will die alone
upon the barren mountain’s crown,
while the bronze bracelets of my soul
clash and ring—
a cry of metal in the wind.

My spirit, caged within this flesh
thin as bone,
surges like the sea—
its tides restless,
its longing endless.

Across the street, curses leap,
mockery burns the air like sparks,
and I whisper,
“I have wrestled.”

Flowers and blue waters
gasp their way upward
toward the gallows of the sky.

Tomorrow! Tomorrow! Tomorrow!
We are human—
unable to bear
the weight of waiting.

Yet still I say,
“I will go.”

The sea murmurs its eternal ebb—
of wandering souls,
of love still trembling,
and of the blue that refuses to drown.

© TaeHun Yoon, 1996