A fisherman
found Kim Ju-yul (김주열)
dead in a South
Korean harbor
a few years
before my omma
was born, though some say
his body washed
ashore in Musan.
During her birth year,
the Beatles sang
“I want to hold your
hand.” I have
to know—her
offerings on
Chilseok (칠석)
for a cucumber,
a pumpkin,
and a melon—
how to make
something grow,
how even if she
hadn’t heard about
Valentina Tereshkova
or that the year
I was born
a hybrid solar
eclipse lasted
7.57 seconds, it’s
as if my omma knew
Gwanju was where
protestors would die
in 1987—it’s as if
she knew certain
conditions must
be met for hoarfrost
to be seen on a jam-red
barberry in Moscow.
Like a lamb’s blood
on a door she held me,
barely perceptible
but definite. We cried
immediately
for a split second,
knees on nature, kissing
—our country, a wild
“honey” beolkkul (벌꿀).
Bo Schwabacher is a South Korean adoptee. Born in South Korea, she was adopted at three-months-old. Bo grew up in Illinois. Her poems have appeared in Cha, CutBank, diode, Nimrod International Journal of Prose and Poetry, Redivider, The Offing, Zone 3, and others. Omma, Sea of Joy and Other Astrological Signs, published by Tinderbox Editions, is her debut collection of poems.