문학과 지성사

We must complete this sequence that starts from a missing number.
From the end to the end
—the freedom of thought you have lost; the forms of my soul, ripening in silence.

Minimal diction, restrained imagery, and forthright structure constitute syzygy, the third poetry collection of Shin Hae-uk, who has worked on building her unique sensorial and epistemological world. Composed of five chapters, the collection pushes to the fore what poet Kim Soyeon aptly and lovingly calls “wormhole,” the gaps left between lines and stanzas by the flaming or flickering words as well as the transparent voices of multiple “Is” born every morning in different shapes. Like the black and white pieces in the game of Go, placed in unexpected directions and patterns, the poems in syzygy draw the topography of the poet’s mind in a more subdued, meticulous, and long-winded touch. “Caught in larger than-life thoughts”(from “The Law of Gravity”), the poet steps into the “beautiful nightmare”(from “Changeling”) in which she readily transforms herself into “you” or the third person, seeking the sounds that “might be waiting for me/outside the acoustic range”(from “Mute”).