Prologue
Screen
Her clothes were red and crushed
tomatoes were pressed
all over
with the stomach wide open.
Why don’t they just use fake blood?
Saying that the metaphor is not like that
we chewed red cherries.
Tie up the faucet means
you’re good at kissing.
Your lips were
red and that was a beautiful trick.
I’ve been carving pome-granate
all night, red liquid seeping
under my nails.
No one deceived but
there was something
like a bone inside.
It was wet when
covered with a white tissue.
There were nights
when we talked about
bad things
said that eating fruit at night
is like a poison,
peeled peaches again and again.
There was a bruise even though
it wasn’t red.
It doesn’t taste good
I have to cut it out.
There have been times
ate bruised fruit and
elighted in its flavor.
There have been times
have licked the dripping juice,
swallowed, laughed,
I once lived like that.
I once thought about
ow a stone would break.
Even then I was standing on the stone.
The chair didn’t get wet when it snowed.
I walked until my feet were wet,
my body wasn’t.
Close your eyes, then we could be in the same darkness.
This is the space between night and dreams, to which we always come back.
Here we walk together through the darkness, in a different way from the day.
Act 1.
31th
It was getting cold.
On the night when fire
is said to be the soul
e walked with fake wings.
Might do scary things.
Speaking,
collecting a bunch of
round and shiny candies
without knowing we’ll throw them away
when the day comes,
enjoying our hands getting heavy.
I once had a secret desire
to go inside the door and be
the person who gives candy,
never had the courage to do it.
We forget the way while walking
or take the same path,
we walked once.
That midnight
when we might have spilled
few.
A well digged inside
becomes the soup of yesterday or tomorrow.
When there is no candy on the table
we brush our teeth thoroughly,
joke around sometimes,
take one or two candies out of the jar and
throw it in the mouth.
One day, when we’re wandering
around the supermarket and find
a round pumpkin,
imagine
igging into it and
becoming a fire.
Snap snap
Listening to the sounds
We gathered at one of us’s houses, each with their own food in one hand. Tonight’s theme, where our interests met, was the night and the ritual. That’s why the time of our meeting was late at night. While cooking the improvised plate,
we chatted back and forth between last year and this year, and shared different ideas about our works and the recipes. We put ourselves
to use, as much as possible, what each of us brought. ow about we all create our own
ritual and do it together tonight? That idea delighted everyone. We were six people, so
six rituals were created. Once we created those
rituals, we naturally knew in what order to do what. As the tip of the incense burned, we smelled the time with our eyes closed or open, that was our clock of the night. The lengths were different. Some rituals took more or less than one incense, some were transformed through recording, some were repeated, some were amplified, and some continued without end. ituals in Asia are deeply connected to conjurations. The effect of an incantation appears after it has been chanted, and we do not
know what effect our spell had or on whom
it worked.
Act 2.
The Food
That is the name of my ritual, it is also the name of my first video work, and the oldest theme
of my poetry. The night is a time that repeats wi-
thin them. We probably all know the way of
getting through the night, a scene excavated from our old memories. Sitting around the light, from the fire or from the moon, sharing the food we made, and creating a story to-
gether. ere, each person chooses one ingredient, and we discuss it together to
make a dish. While eating, we all share a story or memory about the ingredients we chose.
Open Kitchen
There is a scene starting with sunlight shin-
ing through the window, while we’re embracing each other. A small fight happens there, be-
tween me, who doesn’t want to eat breakfast, and you, who insists that eating regularly is good for our health. I move toward the kitchen,
dragging my heavy body. Should I
cook? I shake my head. It digests better if I cook it myself.
Fried egg
Just scramble it. I keep stirring the yolk with chopsticks. A world that becomes one when
I stir and stir, the rotation which I worship.
Warm steam rises from that uniform world.
Sausage
Eating meat gives you power, eating together gives you strength. You vegetarian, who gently
covers my hand with a knife, is probably the sweetest animal in my world. turn on the
blender with a smile. Putting a bunch f
tomatoes grown in our garden and staring at the water swirling, red and red. I am an animal with such eyes. How many pupils are in this sausage?
Every time I cook, I think of my eyes.
Mixer
Grimacing eyes. You’re a person who hates the story of sausages, but who likes the pig’s. Yes,
I like animal stories too. Stories of animals that move and move and move, stories of animals trapped in motion. Stop and stand are both verbs. How kind and beautiful s the world
I worship, the world that neither melts nor
rises, that preserves us. How many eyes are em-
bracing each other inside me. ou and I, who’re being mixed no matter what we do. Why are we moving our forks and knives? Why do our throats gasp and our stomachs scream?
Savory
Is water also thirsty? ater fills my mouth when I stop talking. What kind of moon
shines inside you? With what wish do we bow our heads to each other? Why is a world with two moons and four eyes, a world that can only be handled by stirring and stirring, so wet and round? wo empty round plates, our table with those is warm. This was such a meal.
Thank you,
I ate very well.
In Hanja, the old Chinese characters used in Korean before the invention of Hangeul, ritual was written as 薿窔. It is a compound word
of ‘Je’ (ancestral rites), which resembles the shape of putting meat on the altar, and ‘Rye’
(etiquette), which shows how grain is abundantly
added to the altar. Sharing food used in sac-
rificial rites was an essential part of ritual prac-
tices in ancient Asia, and the most precious food was the body of the priest who presided over the ritual. As shown in many sacrificial rites, food is associated with the body. A story about food is a story about the body. You probably already know how many stories can be
told through food. Each ingredient can be harmonized with its own taste. Our desire
to make it delicious leads to the discovery of new
recipes. That’s how our individual stories
meet. It is the same way the six of us made up our ritual that night. The six of us became
one body performing the ritual. “And God blessed the seventh day and declared it holy, because it was the day when he rested from all his work of creation.” (Genesis 2:3)
Plot point
1. In Korea, two well-known rituals related to the
power of the moon are performed by women
at night. One needs to be done alone, the other is to be done with a group. In the first ritual,
the woman, alone, lays a bowl of water under the
moon and makes a wish, a clear wish in lan-
guage. For the second, which is called 鬼鬼熱錯楚 (Ganggangsuwolae), several women
hold each other’s hands, chant and dance to-
gether under the full moon. There is a chorus
of voices and improvised lyrics. Voices flowing along an empty hook and a common rhythm created by different bodies. It’s not about mak-
ing one’s own wish, it’s about enchantment. That’s what we need. . “Rituals bring forth a community in which resonances occur, one that is capable of accord, of a common rhythm. … Resonance is not an echo of the self; the dimension of the other is inherent in it. … Thus, rituals create a bodily knowledge and memory, an embodied identity, a bodily connec-
tion. A ritual community is a communal body [Körperschaft], and there is a bodily dimension inherent to community.” (Han 2020)
Act 3.
Late night movie
We meet before the movie starts
not to sit emptyhanded.
I’d like to have something sweet and salty here,
hich I don’t usually eat.
You and I hold a big barrel and giggle.
Who would believe we already had dinner?
I wouldn’t have done this if I had come alone.
The screen is large and the stairs are high,
o we move carefully
o find our place.
The surroundings slowly darken and
the scene in front of the eyes glows brightly,
it’s time to move our body quietly.
Someone said we also eat with our eyes,
but we could have more in this way.
ometimes
for example
fried white popcorn with the crunchy sound.
I couldn’t stop my hand,
concentrating on the tip of the tongue.
How much did I eat?
My hand touched the empty floor.
Black heads are lining in front of my eyes
from behind the sounds of swallowing something.
Why is this movie so long? I blink my eyes,
thinking whether we should have bought
a bigger barrel or tougher food.
Lights on and people wake up.
When you ask me what to do until the first train
tell you to get out of here,
o do something digestible,
whether walking through the night or singing.
Epilogue
The next day
It wasn’t easy to keep the eyes open with the brightness. ater was boiling in the pot.
id you wake up? e didn’t realize yesterday that it was this wide here.
We checked on each other’s condition while talking about last night.
Are you okay?
When did we all fall asleep?
I don’t really remember much.
Yesterday we set fire over coals and covered it with iron plates.
We grilled and baked all kind of meat, drank until we couldn’t tell water from alcohol,
and also got our hands burnt while grilling marshmallows.
Right, someone burnt their tongue.
Maybe that is the reason behind all this discomfort.
Maybe the night was too dark, and the fire was too strong
that we ate some uncooked or overcooked.
Someone covers his mouth saying that he wants to throw up,
and we tell him having breakfast would be better for detoxification.
omeone puts scissors on the leftovers,
aying we might be able to eat them if we
emove the burnt parts and reheat them.
Someone counts the number of spoons, and someone lays
yesterday’s newspaper in the middle of the table.
Shouldn’t it have been boiled together from the beginning?
Recipe is just a recipe.
We all grab our own bowls,
and gather around the white steam.