From Arcana

Myung Mi Kim

pr

perdu          lying hidden, disguised. one who acts as a watcher or scout

perdure        to continue, endure, last on

The two are begun

They are shaving ends of sticks

The two are discussing seeds

They are specimens

Glass does not burn but the hillside does

The two are a vine’s exhalation

drum accompaniment

Then follow wood then water, then stones and metals, slow to heat

bbi-due-rrhuh-jut-dah      askew leaning twisted

In the bowels and studies of inferiors

Seaweed stench

“devote”

“wonder”

[when my father died and left me nothing]

[this is how I speak]

“helicopters hover”

“embassy compound”

Relative fence, cling fence

Someone is hiding an infant

Fish with two tails

Fish with two heads

Indigestible over days and days

Unfurled silver maple is a red burnish

War is there and travel

The same is my sister, brothers, and mother

The father is thrush, white at birth and at dusk

Father is burying ground cool to the touch

This is some color but what color is it

“left their homes after two solid days of attacks”

“they had stayed to take care of their cow”

“the extreme cold froze medicine”

“religion and capitalism intersect in the muddy village twenty miles north of”

cabbage looper moth
sugarcane stalk borer

What started then and ate through most of a decade

Contralto: the affliction is very near—and there is no one to help

Sad Sack places the dead dog around her shoulders—weeds higher than her head

Standing as standing might

“I have dissected more than ten human bodies, destroying all the various members

“and removing the minutest particles of flesh which surrounded these veins, without causing

“any effusion of blood … and as one single body did not suffice for so long a time,

“it was necessary to proceed by stages with so many bodies as would render my knowledge complete

The Notebooks, da Vinci

At least 250,000 acres of cotton and fruit crops are under immediate threat from the huge swarm of locusts which have invaded the southern plain from the Pamir Mountains

Roving simians have ripped the curtains off polling booths and pushed some officials preparing for parliamentary elections

In southwest and south central Kansas the worst condition is plants stunted or killed off by extremely dry soil. Adding to farmers’ woes are infestations of green bugs and brown wheat mites

Three villages were overrun by thousands of toads, and farmers in the area reportedly feel that the onslaught is a sign of impending tragedy. Children are said to be terrified by the toads and unable to sleep. The main road connecting the region with La Pas is coated with a thick layer of dead toads and the stench is said to be unbearable.

“peace-keeping troops”

“tanks beneath the windows”

The inside of someone else’s dwelling visible—a table and some chairs.

You start to count one, two, three, four … until the explosion is near your neighborhood. You can guess the position of mortar by this count ing and try to find a safe place.

If the windows are gone, weak plastic is taped up but the strong wind comes and we stay awake.

In this South Cholla Province where all vehicle had been confisticated, we resorted to walking, the method of travel of the Yi Dynasty. We reverted back 300 years.

It’s the same to be in the house, at the shelter or anywhere. There is no safe place. When we have no electricity, we are sitting in the dark and we know what life looked like before Christ.

The central organizing myth of comprehensive knowledge

Bent as light might bend

The openings in the human body

The age that one is

I will be my mother’s age also

Color of robin’s egg against spring grass