Tuesday, June 21, 2011

News at Eleven: The reader follows the postman through six

sections of the poem as he traverses generations and wars. Mun [Dok-su] references everything from a bloody Korean coup in 1455 to the Greek myth of the Judgment of Paris to September 11th to famous words from the Psalms and Tibetan mantras. He imagines a wasteland future of wars fought by robots. As the postman navigates ravaged landscapes, Mun's language is unapologetic, biting:

The skulls of grandfathers, sons, grandsons killed in battle
cover the highlands like the tumuli of royal tombs, roll to and fro like balls,
hit the tawny satchel hanging from one shoulder, bounce away,
end up hanging from the scorched stump of a tree.

from Foreign Policy in Focus: Review: The Postman

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