translated from the Korean by Emily Bettencourt

The kids were on a field trip
They sat quietly in their cabins like they did in their classrooms
Stay still, stay still
They did as they were told and sat quietly
Like screws, like parts
awaiting assembly on a conveyor belt
They put orange life vests on each other as they waited
not knowing that these were the factory uniforms of capitalism
the shrouds they would wear in their prison of water
The children waited until the end for the adults to instruct them
Move, move
If only someone had said these words
If only someone had opened a few doors, a few windows
that classroom would not have become an enormous tomb
The kids were on a field trip
Name tags and backpacks floated on the waves
Bits and pieces of classroom flotsam
Each of those children had beautiful names
and to those who should have protected the boat
they were nothing more than nameless lives

Even as the others abandoned the sinking ship and escaped
the kids were nothing more than freight, passengers worth only the cost of their tickets
Each of those children had parents who loved them
who could do nothing but embrace their cold bodies and wail
The kids who never let go of each other’s hands
even trapped in the deep sea where sunlight does not reach,
who clung to the straps of their life vests and faced the horrors of death
Those kids were on a field trip
They had gone off to learn about death
Even now, there are children trapped in classrooms,
legs caught under desks and chairs,
hands that beat bang, bang against the windows
Whose hands hold the axe that might break the glass?

Translator’s Note: This poem references the 2014 sinking of the MV Sewol off the coast of South Korea, a disaster that killed 304 passengers, including 250 high school students on a school trip. Search operations concluded in 2018, and five passengers are still missing today.

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