Poem: Ten poems on Lee Soo Hyuk (my ICB)

Yesterday, early-early, I opened my computer:
you were there.
A glimpse, merely
But later, all my thoughts were of you.

II
Men should not be so beautiful
Or old women so lustful.

III
As a teenager, I loved David Cassidy,
Edward Albert Jr, Martin Sheen, Jan-Michael Vincent
Forty years later, I'm scouring websites
for stories of you
If I had a grand-daughter, I would steer her to you

IV

I want to be a vowel in your mouth: caressed

V
In the teaser,
You walked across your studio,
eyes moist from welling tears
On the window pane raindrops trailed;
Teaser indeed:
I wished you were not for me.

VI
You make me smile
Jae-rim makes me laugh;
why should i love you so much
you who only make me smile?

VII
A fragile delicate beauty
milk-white skin
some hidden unspoken pain
eyes that become narrow slits when you smile
and I am suddenly lost.

VIII
I did not like suits
until you wore them
you've made me shallow.

IX
Surrounded by your friends
all as young as you
all as beautiful
but even there you stand out:
why has my heart chosen you?

X
My friend asked me what "ICB" meant:
I gave her the literal definition
"Imaginary Celebrity Boyfriend"
The metaphorical meaning
only old women understand.

Poem: Crying for myself

This morning I cried for my life
and how the body betrays --
that the soul wants so much to wander
but the physical body cages.

Once I envied the sprinter
the casual ascender of many stairs
the dancer
the mother who chases her errant child
down rows and rows of city blocks without apparent fear

while i dreaded to rise from bed
fearful my heart would fail

I am so tired now, frail
but no envy
just grief, grief, and regret
that thirty years have been spent in illness.

Thirty years too soon.
Sixty years too soon.
I should not have gotten so old
at such a young age.

Poem: Fall comes suddenly

In the five years since you've moved here
your steps have gotten slower.

All evening, I kept looking at you.
There must've been pity in my eyes.
You walked so slow.

I turned to look at you last night
in the parking lot.
The air was so crisp last night
the leaves swirling about in eddies around our feet

Twenty years we've known each other;
Please live another twenty.
I want my friend always at my side.
In twenty years time, will I be as frail as you?

Remembering how you turned the steering wheel
I think of how relentlessly time turns.

I want to shout to your children:
Be careful with her, she's getting old.
But I can't do that.
You might hear.