The Glacier
Issue Two
Winter 2023

Spectacle

we found the photo on
his phone, a violent train
track from the base of 

his neck to his sacrum, 
melded with red macadam, 
snipped ends of wire
 
whiskers; his blue johnny 
laid opened like stage curtains, 
bunched under his arms

so she could better see, take a
photo using his camera, 
stifle her sudden gasp of awe,  

awakening to something 
amazing, how could this be,  
his torso cut open in half –

put back together, she dared
not touch the seam, re-open
the cage that held her heart; 

she hated that he had to try
so hard to love her

Inchon Airport at 5 am

giant neon halos hang 
from the ceiling/over a row of lanky young trees

in white high tops/ their verdant hair styles 
both brushed: unbrushed/

in a poised: natural stance/ swaying 
to the right/ with the look of abandonment: happiness

like those K-Pop boy bands, their wisps of eyeshadow
and blush/ powdered innocence: powdered swank, on Tik Tok 

dancing/ the Tik Tok of remaking themselves
before dawn breaks/ over the Shilla at the base of 

Namsan mountain/ where the spirits of Obon rush 
past them/ along the festival, the Tik Tok parades/ghosts/ 

those angelic faces, Tik Tok/ never to be children

One Thousand Years from Behind Us

Would there be ocean, crescent valleys of  
       grain, birds of prey circling 
Flower farms for bees and honey, 
       preserved in civilization, its burr and
Blades of helicopters made of glass bodies
       for camouflage in chase in the foothills 
Training for war, deemed for only a state of 
     readiness, distrustful and unyielding
Delineating decorum and sovereignty with
     budgets from taxes, still in trade for plastics
Would the animals collected and born into
       captivity as phenomena watch us
In fear, in quietude, every day and every 
       night as we keep them 
Faces gazing askance, wondering how 
       their lives had come to this
Under siege of fire and brimstone storming 
       south under the rage of red sun
Would nitrogen and oxygen drift through 
       the moon-sphere and cool their nostrils
Would the Earth be volatile, tempestuous 
       bone cold 
Would there be luminosity from the galaxy,
       from depths of sea, of golden kelp beds 
Where seals and otters play at the cove 
       in breaks of light 
Would this be how the animals understood 
       freedom, their bodies permeated, 
Accustomed to isolation, to enclosures 
       Would there be anyone left to decide to 
Live life in some other way, to discover one 
       thousand years from behind us the 
Mountain is higher, past what we could see —  
       what would children left there think?  ¹

¹ The Possibilities Of Poetry: On ‘Be With’ By Forrest Gander, Lotte L.S. , September 23rd, 2018 08:44; see https://thequietus.com/articles/25352-be-with-forrest-gander-review (“According to Rafael Nuñez, a cognitive scientist at the University of California, Aymara is the only studied culture for which the past is linguistically and conceptually in front of its speakers, while the future lies behind them. The word for future is also the word for behind, as is the word past the same as front. When people talk in Aymara about the future they gesture backwards; when they mention the past they gesture forward.”)

GEORGIA SAN LI is at work on a novel, poetry and other writings. Her poetry appears in the Antigonish, Atlanta Review, Confluence (UK), La Piccioletta Barca, Ravensperch, and other journals. Poems are forthcoming in Willow Springs. She is the author of “Wandering,” which was a Minerva Rising poetry chapbook finalist and selected for publication by Finishing Line Press (January 2024). Her poetry was included on the short list for the 2023 Oxford Poetry prize. She has been supported by the Community of Writers and the Kenyon Review Novel Workshop.

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