POEM 1
“Sublime Kitchen” / Takju 16
From: Mommy Must Be a Fountain of Feathers
Publisher: Action Books, Notre Dame, Indiana, 2008
They came to eat the moon again
The women ate the moon and their bellies grew each month
They squeezed breast-milk into the moon,
Added the refreshing scent of mint to the roasted moon
I caught a glimpse of her kitchen once
The secretive chirp of the cooks dressed in white
The swirling storm severing the necks of wild ducks
on hundreds of wooden chopping boards
It was a sublime kitchen
A guest with a child entered
Mommy, mommy, can I have a glass of tangy star?
She brought out a drink made of powdered rain cloud
and floated an icy star in it
I caught a glimpse of her kitchen once
The rain cloud of flour mushroomed
and all kinds of dead animals’ blood flowed down the drain
the cries of countless spoons, chopsticks, fingers, toes
got sucked into the dishpan
It was a sublime kitchen
It’s time to prepare a midnight meal
She cracked the moon over the frying pan
a hole as deep as a fingernail appeared on the moon
then a flock of birds crawled out from the hole
with their wings that can be fried
The flock of birds spread their black wings
across the sky as the night deepened
She roasted the wings all night
Slobbered, chewed, licked, burped, chewed and chewed, sucked, tasted, drank,
got fed nonstop, swallowed and shouted Cheers! Eat more! Hey, Over here! One
more bottle! Smacked lips, belched, gagged
Like the lips that never once closed
the buildings on both sides of the street at night
the sound of them being fed the night sky through their huge openings
Everything was sublime
POEM 2
“Lowering the Coffin” (Day Thirty-Five) / Hwaju 12
From: Autobiography of Death
Publisher: New Directions Publishing, New York, NY, 2018
The wind that gently ties thin streaks of rain into moist ribbons and pins
Them to your nipples has arrived
Ticklish yellow piss, yellow cloud that drizzles down the gutter has arrived
The girl pulled out from you cries under the eaves
Dead from childhood, your older sister pinches your belly with her frail
Fingernails
Ghost, you break off green fingernails, Spring, you’re a step ahead of me
Playwithme playwithme, twirling skinny pinkies
Spiky sprouts burrow through your teary eyes
The smell of your sister’s barely-showing underwear, floating about in the
Air
Then the smell of her rotten grave panties when they land on your nose
Broth made from ribs rises and falls in your body. The ribs are your coffin,
carrying you around
Someone is lowering your coffin into a deep hole–hazylazy skylark–
someone is lowering your coffin
Dark flesh-colored tree gulps down a sip of win in the midst of lifting up
your sister’s skirt
Why haven’t you left? Every morning the sky, the blue vein slaps you hard
Before your skinny fingers are born, the cherry-blossom-wind bursts your
pink cheeks in their white mourning dresses
The tire marks of a Cadillac hearse zigzag across the green barely field
The mountain stretches and yawns, lifting the hydrangea blossoms from its
belly
Flowers chirp like birds with blood-stained beaks, they keep spitting their
bloodied teeth
POEM 3
“A Face” (Day Forty-Three) / Yakju 14
From: Autobiography of Death
Publisher: New Directions Publishing, NY, NY, 2018
World without a sound. Untouchable, flat world. When death dawns,
world turns into a hard mirror. Faraway world of hope. The mirror reflects
all things like the face of someone whose insides are dead. The shape of a
woman appears in the mirror. Now you’ve become toeless feet. Now you’ve
become fingerless hands. You’ve become a noseless, mouthless face. Your
iInsides that are so far away yet close, the forest in your hair, light enters the
rocky moon, and the sea wavers in your shoes. Birds fly up your sleeves and
trapped inside a round mirror, a woman whose tongue is melting inside her
mouth cries inside the slippery edge of the freezing mirror. The full moon
wanes. Whenever the sleek mirror flashes in her eyes, something heavy and
transparent stomps on her face. The hard world can be seen but not entered.
The world is white like a movie screen but with clenched fists. Perhaps the
woman’s faint arms are still stirring it.
POEM 4
“Shredded Bird” / Beojju
From: Phantom Pain Wings | COMMUNITY OF PARTING
Publisher: New Directions Publishing, New York, NY, 2023
Clear skies over Korea, aren’t you scared? The weather comes and asks
Me
As soon as I imagine a bird falling through the vast, deep, blue sky
the weather returns and asks, Dark clouds all over Korea, aren’t you scared?
At the psychiatric clinic of Professor H, I pretend that I’m not staring at the
Rows of patients and their guardians sitting on the sofa. Everyday I’m scared
Of wholenation, wholecitizens, wholeweather, wholenews.
When I unbutton my pajamas
scaryscarybirds fly high
from my scaryscarybed
I shred my poetry books daily and fold birds
I fly “Bloom, Pig!” up in the air
Birds go where they can’t be seen and die alone
My books also go where they can’t be seen and die
They’ve taken a beating before they croaked
Every night I see the same face
when I lift the funeral hemp cloth to pay my condolences
Poetry-or-bird or bird-or-me or wants-to-say-it’s-me-bird or this poem
wraps itself in gooseflesh beneath the feathers
Today, a Pineapple Express over the wholenation, aren’t you scared? The
weather asked again tirelessly
I answer without imagining anything,
I’m scared of Pineapple Express
While I walk in wholenation rain, unable to open my eyes
A foot bigger than my cradle steps in
Daddy, I’ll cut your toenails for you
Thunder and lightning keep asking, Aren’t you scared? Aren’t you scared?
Today I become exactly five thousands birds and
Fly into the downpour of toenails
I storm off, flying up high
Every bird has a different weather system, different mental illness
Today’s five thousand weather forecasts, five thousand horoscopes
Aren’t you scared of today’s wholenation depression? The weather returned
And asked
When I look down, wholenation is teeming with hospital wards
In one of the wards, I answer, I’m scared of the Express
WRITING PROMPT #1
Using visceral and jagged language relate the poetics of a nursery to that of a dead carcass. Get grotesque, get detailed, make up words, use plenty of verbs, and leave traditional conventions aside.
WRITING PROMPT #2
What does the disappearance of poetry look, sound, taste, and feel like? Draw upon your own life, as well as the information you’ve gained thus far on the historical implications of makgeolli and Hyesoon’s poetry to write a “proem”.
WRITING PROMPT #3
Phantom Pain Wings is often referred to as Hyesoon’s personal ornithology or “winged ventriloquy”. In the words of her publisher, Phantom Pain Wings is an “ epic sequence of bird ventriloquy exploring the relentless physical and existential struggles against power and gendered violence.
Write your own I-do-animal sequence that explores themes of the “feminine grotesque” against the “masculine porcelain”.
This evening's Wine Poetic unveils the brilliance of one of South Korea’s most cherished contemporary poets, intertwined with the rich allure of its esteemed ancestral libation: makgeolli [mahk-ohl-lee]. What’s more, we get to immerse ourselves in the very space where this exquisite pairing comes to life: Hana Makgeolli’s Brewery & Tasting Room. Here, we shall hear the inspiring tales of Alice Jun (and Benny!), who honor their Korean heritage through this time-honored elixir. As we ponder each sip, let us reflect on the profound themes of death and transformation woven into the fabric of winemaking--and existence. Hyesoon reminds us that within the embrace of Death, we discover “the horizon inside the vanishing point.”
Hana Makgeolli is the first domestic producer of unfiltered Korean rice wine the U.S., and a symbol of artisanal craftsmanship here in Brooklyn, NY. Their creations honor Korean heritage and dedication to quality, using only organic rice, nuruk, and traditional brewing methods to reveal a spectrum of complex flavors. Typically fermented to dryness, their drinks balance rich grain notes with natural lactic acid, offering a warm embrace reminiscent of home.
A Glossary of Sool and Makgeolli Terms
There’s always a learning curve when it comes to mastering wine, cheese, tea, coffee, and more in the world of alcohol and ferments. The same is true for the deep category of sool. With hundreds of years of history behind it, being equipped with culturally and factually accurate terminologies can help you better understand this storied drink. Below are a few essential terms for the sool enthusiast or newly acquainted makgeolli home brewer.
Ingredients
With sool being such a complex and dynamic drink, you might be surprised to learn that each brew requires only three (and sometimes four) crucial ingredients. It’s water, nuruk, and rice, which can include mepsal, chapsal, or a combination of the two. Here’s a bit of how we source our ingredients below.
Ssal 쌀 Rice. We source our organically grown rice from Polit Farms in Maxwell, CA. They are a small family-owned farm that’s been in operation since 1983.
Mepsal 맵쌀 - Medium Grain White Rice
Chapsal 찹쌀 - Sweet / Glutinous White Rice
Nuruk 누룩 - Fermentation starter. Native to Korea, this is a wheat and barley-based starter, inoculated with wild saccharifying fungus, lactobacillus, and yeast.
Water - You can’t make any alcohol without quality water. At Hana Makgeolli, we use New York water filtered for chlorine using a carbon filter.
Process
Go beyond the two glass doors in our Tasting Room, and you’ll discover how our thoughtfully sourced ingredients come together in a weeks-long process. While makgeolli homebrews can be as short as a Danyangju, or a one-step fermentation process, our brews go through anything from a Samyangju to an Oyangju. Here are a few other terms you might come across when talking about our sool production.
Mitsool 밑술 - First or base ferment made with a porridge of medium-grain white rice
Dotsool 덧술 - Added feeds e.g. Second, Third, Fourth, etc.
Godubap 고두밮 - Steamed rice
Gumong Dduk 구멍떡 - Boiled donut shaped rice cake
Juk 죽 - Porridge
Beombok 범벅 - Half-cooked, paste. Uses less water than porridge.
Baeksulgi 백설기 - Ground, steamed rice cake
Danyangju 단양주 - Single Stage Ferment
I/Sam/Sa/O-yangju 이/삼/사/오-양주 - Two/Three/Four/Five Stage Ferment
General
When talking about the category of sool at our Tasting Room, we use these terms to honor the drink’s storied history. Here are just a few that you might commonly hear in conversation!
Jeontongju 전통주 - Traditional Korean alcohols, implies made with nuruk, using traditional methodologies and ingredients
Sool 술 - Korean word for alcohol, best used to describe the entire category.
Takju 탁주 - The sedimented portion of a brew. Also used to refer to sool with sediment that are above 10% ABV.
Wonju 원주 - The entirety of a brew post coarse filtration, prior to any dilution.
Yakju 약주 - Clarified sool that is made with nuruk.
Cheongju 청주 - Common word used to describe clarified sool but actually originally the word used to describe clarified sakes made in Korea.
Makgeolli 막걸리 - Interchangeable with Takju but formally used to describe sedimented sool below 10% ABV
Soju 소주 - Another popular category of sool. Distilled wonju or yakju becomes soju.
Yangjoojang - Brewery
Joomak - Sool Bar / Tasting room / Anju serving place. Our Tasting Room is at 201 Dupont St in Greenpoint, Brooklyn.
Sooljib - Bar. We have eight seats at our bar, with a view of the cocktail-making magic.
Our Products
At any given time, we offer three classic sools, plus a few more seasonal brews such as botanical makgeolli. For a more detailed guide to our products, be sure to check out the page Our Sool.
TAKJU 16 - 3 stage brew, fermented over 28 days using 900 lbs of rice. TAKJU is known for its heavy body, high abv (16%), and extremely fruity flavor profile.
HWAJU 12 - 4 stage brew, fermented over 35 days using 750 lbs of rice and fermented with closed yellow bud chrysanthemums and hydrangea tea leaves. HWAJU is known for its lighter body and neutral base that allows the subtle tea infusion to shine.
YAKJU 14 - 5 stage brew, fermented over 70 days using 700 lbs of rice. Our YAKJU is a clarified rice wine that is known for its delicate body and striking balance between fruit and depth of grain.
