THE VISITOR
This week, I would like to share with you a Korean poem. A special treat for Korean speaking readers. Don’t’ worry if you don’t read Korean. I attempt to provide you with my own translation into English. I know it is extremely tricky to translate a poem from another language. Consider this more of a paraphrase than an actual translation. Hopefully I have not butchered the poet’s original meaning.
방문객
정현종
사람이 온다는 건
실은 어마어마한 일이다.
그는
그의 과거와
현재와
그리고
그의 미래와 함께 오기 때문이다.
한 사람의 일생이 오기 때문이다.
부서지기 쉬운
그래서 부서지기도 했을
마음이 오는 것이다---그 갈피를
아마 바람은 더듬어볼 수 있을
마음.
내 마음이 그런 바람을 흉내낸다면
필경 환대가 될 것이다.
The Visitor by Hyun Jong Jung
The event of another human being coming to visit me
is quite an astonishing endeavor.
It is precisely because the person arrives with all of
one’s past
present
and future.
Because the person arrives with one’s entire life.
The person arrives with the fragility of one’s heart
and thus, could have been heartbroken. The lostness of one’s soul
can perhaps be caressed by wind.
If I who welcome can imitate the gentle caress of the wind,
it will undoubtedly be hospitality.
I love the gentle and almost coy tone of this poem. Yet it is bold and transparent at the same time. The topic of being visited by visitors is something we all can relate to as human beings, sometimes welcomingly and sometimes grudgingly, and sometimes numbingly.
The visitor is who one is because of one’s past, present, and future that will be carved out. This entire person with one’s whole package of life is sacred and weighty (literally means glory in the Old Testament language). This poem beckons honor and generosity, granting the healthy benefit of the doubt to those who visit us.
There is brokenness and thus tenderness in all of us. Some don’t want to admit there is brokenness in their life for multiple reasons. I would press the point that the sooner we accept our brokenness, the sooner we will experience grace. “There is a crack, a crack in everything. That’s how the light gets in,” sings Leonard Cohen in Anthem. And sooner we embrace our own brokenness, the better we are able to embrace others’ brokenness. No solidarity is as strong and powerful as the bond of accepted brokenness as human beings, it seems.
Our life is sacred and weighty because we are broken. Our brokenness is a highway in discovering the very sacredness of our life.
Wind can be many things. The unpredictable and free nature of wind is what makes wind wind. It can also be soothing. I can vividly remember sitting outside on our back deck during a sabbatical in the mornings, while the sun was warm, sometimes I could feel the gentle cool breeze rising from the ground and I would quietly whisper “Aaahhhh.” Coupled with Thomas Merton’s journal in one hand and warm coffee in the other hand, when the cool breeze visited me at the time of my heart’s consent with Merton’s words, I had likened it to be the intimate visitation from the Lord that morning.
How does one imitate wind? Today, I imagine wind as dancing. A kind of dancing that is non-intrusive but cuddly, embracing, and befriending. . . Ultimately inviting others to join in the dance. . .
Hospitality is brokenness befriending brokenness in a non-judgmental and safe space where reciprocal healing and restoration of our soul take place. And we will all be appropriately warmed or cooled by the wind of hospitality.