Sentiments and Baggage (2025)
I have this attachment to my physical belongings,
full of contradictions.
I despised the clutter I grew up in.
But underneath this all,
I am desperate
to find heirlooms in my present moments,
so I can bring things to my show-and-tell
to prove to everyone
that yes,
I do belong.
Object 1
Her college coat,
when I was just like her and she was just like me.
I wonder how much more we could dream about together.
I found it when I was 17 years old, prying through her closet
and she looked at me confused,
why I would want such a worn thing
When I was 20 years old,
I draped myself in this coat frantically as the weather called for it
I laughed
cried
got drunk
danced
isolated
explored
got lost
and loved in this coat
I think she did the same too.
Object 2
Julia’s great grandmother's sewing machine from 1934
sits on my desk in my first Chicago apartment
It is now 2025,
and I giddily make insect wings for my halloween costume
reckless through the stitches
skipping
ripping
jamming the machine
At that same moment,
my mom labors away in front of her machine
to hem a teen’s floral dress for a wedding abroad
alert
furrowed
She swears in Korean but everyone knows she is angry.
My 상할머니 made silk from silkworms
and maybe,
this sewing machine was always meant to find the women in my lineage
in some deranged way or another.
In my haze of living in Korea as a child,
I remember 상할머니 short and slender figure
She would take me to visit my grandma at work
who roasted seaweed at the local market
I don’t remember 우리 상할머니 face
we have no photos of her in the States…
lost when sentiments became baggage
I think I remember her hands…
the way she laid on her back on the heated wooden floor...
She would usher me into her room,
stuffing money in my tiny hands to go buy myself a treat
When she passed
I heard my mom crying on the phone
her tears rang
but only once
as she frankly said,
“when the bodies are far apart, the hearts become too”
She said she didn’t feel sad for long
and I believe her
our comfort was a 15 hour flight away that we couldn’t afford
instead,
we grieved
into the empty air
just for a moment
with no response.
상할머니 was the first
of the next three deaths in my family
that we continued to hear over the phone
Object 3
My childhood quilt
was made by my mom and aunt
I bundle myself
with the childlike wonder
sewed into every square
to preserve her
as a child of diaspora,
she was confused
unknowingly traumatized
by her now ambiguous identity
that no one bothered to explain
I love her.
The third death,
우리 할아버지,
saw her last in 2017.
My mom told me
weakly over the phone.
I teared up
I knew she had cried
I barely remembered his face
But
we saw each other again
in 2023
in my dream,
when he asked me how I had grown up so much,
and that I looked beautiful
he passed away
through the phone
through my dreams
and through this text
------
self published in Silience in Chicago: Obscure Objects, Fall/Winter 2025 issue