The Magical Language of Others

by E.J. Koh

Forty-nine letters were discovered after an unknowable number had been trashed or forgotten. In Buddhist tradition, forty-nine is the number of days a soul wanders the earth for answers before the afterlife.

The present is the revenge of the past.

There is a Korean belief that you are born the parent of the one you hurt most.

She stood a prisoner of her own light.

“I’m not there, so your brother will take his anger out on you. Mommy knows all too well. Try to remember that he is mad at me, not you.”

Children have no concept that every moment comes to end, but rather feel as though their suffering, at present, will last for an eternity. One small thing, taken away, was to feel the loss endlessly.

If you have no suffering, you have no story to tell—isn’t it true?”

“When you age, wrinkles don’t make you older. They make you look more like yourself,” she warned me. “Everything comes to the surface eventually.”

I did not cry in front of my mother, never having asked her to take me with her.

Pay attention to your health, and times like these, read a bunch of good books. Things you don’t know, things you can’t experience, all of it lies inside of books.

Well, babies should give heartaches and be exhausting so that Mommies can grow. And learn. Isn’t that right?

While your parents are alive, eat as much of their love as you can, so it can sustain you for the rest of your life.”

The first time I had made myself throw up, at the age of sixteen, I had found relief in my Davis bathroom.

From then on it was normal for me to go on eating, then undo what I had done. There were tooth marks on my knuckles. My jaw was swollen.

I swore that I would not do it while staying with my mother.

“Young women,” she said, “are more valuable than men these days.”

When you’re my age, you think you’ll outgrow everything, but it’s not true. Every day, my thoughts change, and I lose control.

However, Eun Ji, our lives, being given to us, is the most precious time. Of course, the ups and downs go together, but let’s not (waste) any moment not feeling happy (not being happy).

Do you understand? Working together, you are much stronger. You can’t only help others either. When you’re having a hard time, tell somebody.

Everything is a process. Everything passes . . . Let’s always try to live with a bright, beaming heart.

She said that Jun might feel better if she let go of her hurt and her long-held resentment.

The trouble with hiding is that either you are found before you are killed, or you are killed before you are found—death hides you forever.

Languages, as they open you, can also allow you to close.

When I felt myself running toward seclusion, I heard my grandmother and my great-grandfather urging me to try—and how much harder one must try when learning to love. She never asked me to speak but to understand, rather than endure to forgive, and never to sacrifice, only to let go.

Suffering is trusted to shape one’s skills and spirit.

“You’re heavier than you look,” Hee Chul frowned. “It’s heavy for Korea. The girls here are smaller and lighter. A girl should be a sheet of paper.”

You have to be strong because this industry is always going to be dirty and unfair.”

We played video games together because we, as brother and sister, had come from the same place, and that was the place we longed for, which united us.

Korean classroom etiquette places the greatest burden on the student. If the teacher is cryptic, it is the student’s job to understand. American classrooms burden the teacher, who is expected to be clear and specific rather than wise. The students turned on Joe with their frustrations. Joe had cast us off. Joe had let us get lost.

“It’s not meant to be given to you,” he said. “That’s why it’s a difficult grace.”

“We’re looking up close.” “Everybody can look, can’t they?” Joe took a deep breath. “I don’t know. But you have to care. Those of you who’ve decided to stay and try this out—it’s because you care.”

Writing a poem, I came out of absolute darkness. Hundreds of poems I wrote about my mother and grandmother, desperate to write down those who only ever appeared in my head. I hoped for a future with poems and to be alone with them.

At my desk, I felt grateful and alive.

“The poems you wrote before are unforgiving,” Joy told me. “You don’t have to forgive your mother. I’m not telling you to forgive her. But the poem must forgive her, or the poem must forgive you for not. Otherwise, it’s not a poem.” “Like magnanimity?” I asked. She put her hands on the table. “Yes, magnanimity,” she said. “You can say anything you want—with magnanimity.

“Forgiveness doesn’t need a reason. It doesn’t follow a logical thought, so it frees you from having to be reasonable.”

“You can say whatever you want—if you reckon with it.” Joy asked me to be relentlessly forgiving and magnanimous toward all conditions of human life, and equally toward those of my own. She encouraged me to look closely, and said poetry would teach me how to pay attention and show me how to care. I must choose love over any other thing. Then, the world would open up for me. “Do you see now?” she asked me. “That’s why a poem is more than just words—it’s why poets have everything.”

My father once said, about his military training: it is human nature to choose sleep over food amid exhaustion and hunger.

I was not unaware of my father’s work, not in the way she feared, yet I resented his sacrifice. My brother later revealed: he was the one who had encouraged our father to take the job in Korea. He promised our father he would oversee me. My brother was never angry about the job until they asked for more time. It was our parents who, terrified to leave that job, did not come back for us.

When my mother asked me if I was happy to have her back anyway, I was not sure whether I should tell her I was happy, and then, whether it would be true.

Most poems I typed quickly in my room on 148th. I read them aloud to hear the words until they lost all reason, and what remained was an urge.

Noah seemed to address me directly: “If you want to be a good poet, then write poetry. If you want to be a great poet, then translate.”

I cupped my mouth. “How can I be a good poet? I don’t even know how to be a good person.” He said sternly, “All you have to be is ready.”

Only when I left him could I hear his warning. Doing things other than writing helped him to see poetry for what it was and to understand life for what it should have been for him.

He was not just a great poet, but a person who had lived in a way that others saw in him a greatness, and in themselves, the belief that such greatness can exist.

The world is a fun place. We are not born to win or lose against others. I am here to be happy for myself.

My father asked me, “What are you going to do for work?” His question surprised me. “I’m working—” “No, you’re not.” My mother sat herself at the table. “You’re teaching poetry.” My father paused. “You’re not a complete person if you don’t work.” He believed all paths lead to work.