Giljoon Lee

Arrival

At the cafe I see you
in line but I know
it is not you. Only

his hair resembles yours—
whitening at the edges, perpetually
backlit. I am beginning to forget

your face. I remember
only your shadow
and the light that birthed it.

Still, I picture myself hugging him.
My memories will not hold. You know
this. I think of you and I think of my father

in heaven. Is our home a kind of heaven?
Or is it a jail cell? Or is it
a country. Is your home my home too? 

Through the window of the taxi
red taillights blind me.
I close my eyes and I see

my own skin
as an abstraction. Slowly,
the red fades

except for the center—
a cross. And I'm at your apartment,
after the sunset

watching the neon glow
from the local church flood
the small room in its likeness.

Soon the sun will begin
to rise and the world will be purple—
except this light is mine

while yours is blindingly
red. Back here in the backseat
the white of the streetlights

penetrates the interior in a rhythm
like an ellipsis. Little monoliths.
How lonely the imitation.

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Giljoon Lee is from South Korea. He lives in California and edits MEARI, a poetry magazine that highlights poems’ writing processes. His work is forthcoming in Shō Poetry Journal.