Clandestine Journey by Yeon Myung-ji

I am the man with the biggest mouth in Hebei Province,

Choosing only the words that favor me
from those that drift about the world.

People fly into Lintong—
I do not know them, yet they act as though they know me.
Wherever the boredom of life touches down,
the lines grow long, and the borders of the world contract.
I am a persuasive traveler.
Truth is, the days I have not faced the mirror
pile up damp and dim within me.

I have long dwelled in the darkness
where lions made their camp—
but this, still, is my secret city.

Unaware that arrows were tailing me,
I made my rounds until illness struck me down in Sagugung.
A man slandered by their lips,
mocked, I left Qin again and again.

Now I can understand the Jeolla dialect
that once cursed me for building a grand tomb.
No one has seen my face
since death came upon me suddenly, like burning paper—
a quiet death, making all worldly splendor pale.

A tomb is a warm place
for the one who looks toward the far corner
rather than a neighbor’s plot.
A woman—an aide to the angels—
touches the sleepers in their burial hollows
whispering with a few lingering spirits in Xi’an.

The world you live in is one of deceit and deception.
Pass by coldly, like rain.
If you glance about at unseen followers,
the tail that notices your faltering step—
then comes the jolt, and what follows, no one can tell.

The soldiers of the Terracotta Army
still roll their sorrowful eyes.

I am the man with the longest neck in Hebei Province—
Qin Shi Huang, who sleeps in short bursts like a giraffe.

Profile

Poet Yeon Myeong-ji began her literary career in 2013 with the poetry collection 『Gashibi』, published in the Minerva Poetry Series.

Her published works include the poetry collections 『Sitting Like an Apple』 and 『Where would the House of the  Sorry' be? 』 the e-poetry collection 『Seventeen Marco Polos,』 and the travel essay 『Step by Step, Walking the Camino.』

She has received the Tolstoy Literary Award, the Homi Literary Award, the Cheongsong Gaekju Literary Award, and the Aviation Literary Award. In 2025, she was awarded the Bronze Prize in Poetry at the Literature Asia Awards.

Her poems have been translated and published in local languages in India, Pakistan, Kosovo, Italy, Egypt, the United States, and Belgium,UK,Germany.