Recitation

by Suah Bae

  Unlike with my father, the word ‘mother’ always called up a feeling of closeness for me, intimate and affectionate. I always carried her photo in my wallet, a stylish profile shot from her younger days, part of her actor’s portfolio. I had the vague sense that I resembled my mother in terms of physical appearance, and that that meant my voice and delivery must also be similar to hers. If anyone who had loved my mother was still alive, no doubt they would also love me. I’ve lived in the same city as my mother my whole life. I even bumped into her once, quite by chance, in the city centre. I didn’t recognise her straight away. She was at least twenty-something years older than the mother in the photograph (which had been taken before I was born, of course). But my mother was none other than the woman in that photograph; age hadn’t changed her into someone else. It was in a subway station where our paths crossed; a few seconds later, my feet were carrying me in the direction of her retreating figure. In other words, it wasn’t me who chose to follow her, but my feet. She was wearing a black coat with a wide collar and carrying a large lilac-and-pearl bag. She must have a script in her bag, I thought to myself, the script for a recitation that she’ll perform this evening. Each time she changed direction, the hem of her coat swept around as though she were dancing lightly. At that point, I’d never seen her on stage. I’d never seen her in person at all. All I’d done was listen to several radio broadcasts of her recitations. Now that I think about it, I can’t understand why I never went to see her perform at a recitation theatre. Strange, isn’t it? It would be closest to the truth to say that it simply never occurred to me. Probably because I’m not particularly a fan of recitations. I assumed she was on her way to the theatre. She got onto a train, and I followed. I’d originally been on my way to meet someone, but at a certain point I forgot all about that. I was busy gazing at her silhouette, reflected in the carriage window. It was around the time when most office workers commute home, so the train was fairly packed. She got off after two stops. She’d been standing there quietly, without giving any indication that her stop was coming up, so I was unprepared when the doors opened and she abruptly slipped out. I had to make a mad dash to get off before the doors closed, and by the time I’d shoved my way off the train and onto the platform, she was already on her way up the stairs. My feet sped up, but she was no slouch herself. Only once I’d panted my way up to the ticket barrier was I able to dodge in front of her. I wanted to get a look at her face, you see. But as luck would have it, she was rummaging around in her bag for her purse and had her head deeply bowed.

  After a few seconds of me walking in front like this, I looked back over my shoulder to check which direction she was heading in. But I hadn’t expected her to be quite so close—practically treading on my heels—and as she was walking very rapidly we only narrowly avoided a head-on collision. We were both startled, and I took a reflexive step back. She’d been charging forwards, but I’d turned around quite hesitantly, and now, flinching back, was unable to keep my balance. I stumbled, and ended up thunking down on the floor. She was the first to apologise, apparently considering our collision to be her fault as she’d been walking along lost in thought. I’m very sorry, she said, helping me to my feet. I was still a little shaken, but hearing her voice made me too happy to care. But she darted off before I had time to say anything in response, swept away by the surging rush hour tide. It all happened very quickly, but I had time to notice that her walking speed, the speed at which she disappeared, was much greater than that of those around her.

  I went around telling people how, in the twenty years since I was born, my one encounter with my mother was when I was out one day and bumped into her by chance, literally bumped into her, as in I actually ended up on the ground. But no one believed me. I would have been happy to inform my father, if he had still been in a position to understand human speech; regrettably, this was not the case. Only then did it occur to me that if I wanted to meet this mother of mine, an actor who gave frequent performances, all I needed to do was attend one of her recitations. As I’ve already mentioned, though, I’m hardly an aficionado when it comes to such things, and besides, I was worried about choosing a particularly unpopular recitation and ending up conspicuously alone in the audience, and so I never did go and see her on stage. I did, however, sit in a café opposite the theatre where she was giving a recitation, stationed by the window so I would be able to see her emerge after the performance. When she did exit the theatre, she was accompanied by a bespectacled man, which threw me somewhat. I’d assumed she would be alone, so I couldn’t make up my mind whether to follow her as planned or just stay where I was, avoiding her altogether. It wasn’t as though I had any particular intention beyond just following her for a while, like last time—in other words, until I could no longer keep up—then going back home once I’d lost sight of her. But while I was hesitating over the best course of action, the two of them walked right over to the café, came in, and took a seat at the next table. There wasn’t anything especially odd about that, as it was the only empty table in the tiny café. I pretended to be engrossed in a magazine, but the writing was just shapes on a page. They ordered one regular coffee and one espresso. They talked, mainly about the performance she’d just given, and about the one coming up the following month. Though the man had an affable look about him, as though permanently amused by something, his desire to dominate the conversation was still obvious. Judging by the way he spoke—loudly and at length, frequently repeating himself—he was almost certainly the producer of the upcoming performances. She, on the other hand, spoke relatively little, favouring brief responses over introducing any topic of her own. Yes, no, really, I assure you there was, that’s right, that doesn’t make sense, I don’t think that would be possible. She gave the impression of wanting to make her voice as unobtrusive as possible. The way unusually tall or large women often hunch up, trying to make themselves seem smaller. Her hands were in constant, seemingly nervous motion, either rotating at the wrists, pulling at her hair, or folding the napkin into complicated shapes only to smooth it out and start again. At one point, she even straightened each finger in turn and examined her palm. Like the kind of gesture an actor might make while performing a ‘vaguely conscious character’ in a one-person play. Though their conversation was on general topics, as I listened I began to suspect that they were either a married couple, lovers, or having an affair. I’ve no idea what gave me that impression. Not only did they neither touch each other nor discuss anything especially private, they actually used honorifics when addressing each other. I kept my gaze firmly on the magazine, staring at the same page for an awfully long time. When I eventually flipped it closed, the man turned absent-mindedly in my direction and muttered, “Journal of Shamanism Abroad? All these magazines have such weird names.”

  The magazine’s name seemed to catch my mother’s attention. Having just finished re-straightening each of her curled fingers, she turned and glanced keenly at me, no, at the magazine cover. Conscious of an implicit question in their gaze, I told them that it was a magazine for shamans living abroad. It’s not distributed in Korea, so it’s no wonder you don’t know it. And added, but I’m not a shaman, I’m a journalist, I write articles for this magazine. Really, the man said, a journalist at your age!

  “Well, I’m only a trainee,” I answered, “I’m still at university.” “Is the magazine available in Berlin?” This time she was the one who addressed me.

  “Yes, it is. The company that publishes it provides financial support for some foreign students to study there. There’s also a Korean shamanism research foundation who give out scholarships. And several of those students write pieces for the magazine.”

  “Coming across something I never even would have guessed existed—admittedly, not something directly related to my field of interest, but still—it really puts a spring in your step. Invigorating, you know,” the man said, sounding as though he genuinely was staggered by his chance encounter with the phenomenon of Korean shamans abro
ad. This exaggerated response turned out not to be entirely groundless, as what the man then went on to speak of was clearly intended to show off his membership of that intellectual minority who are interested in ancient culture and cave art, prehistoric and primitive things. The many cave paintings overlooked by UNESCO, forgotten ancient artworks, figures of the female body used by the earliest members of the human race in shamanic and divinatory practices, etc. It was clearly a field in which my mother had no interest. Or at least, not in the way that the man did. He rambled on, displaying a fragmentary knowledge mainly gleaned from things he’d heard secondhand or read about in magazines, and showered me with questions to which my answers consisted partly of my own fantastic notions and partly of lies concocted then and there (though he seemed entirely oblivious to my shamming). The longer the conversation dragged on, the more evident my mother’s boredom became. She yawned. I noticed that while she was yawning, under the table her hand darted to the man’s thigh. It looked like a signal for him to quit this stifling talk so they could get out of there. He plainly wanted to stay and brag some more, but he couldn’t ignore such a clear sign. He was sorry. From the impression I got that day, he seemed the regretful type. He even shook my hand as he stood up, which seemed bizarrely formal given the circumstances of our meeting. He gave me his business card, saying that my mother would be giving a performance the following week, and that if I had time I should come along. It’s something that a woman like yourself, very young but with a wise head on your shoulders, and engaged in specialised journalism, would be sure to find interesting, he said before he left. My mother stood mute by his side, like a tall umbrella.

  Did the letter from Berlin ever reach my mother? I stayed in the café for a while after they’d left, lost in thought.

  The bird bore the shaman’s wife to a barren tract of reddish ground, by the side of a large river; it landed in front of the small hut that stood there. The hut had walls of flat stones, a roof of rags and tree branches that had been washed there by the river, and was so low you had to stoop to enter.

  The river’s fierce clamour shook all the world, like thousands of stones tumbling down from a high mountaintop.

  The river was a bright grey. Each time the swift current crashed against the rocky riverbed a burst of angry spume was thrown up, as though threatening to engulf the shaman’s wife.

  There was neither boat nor boatman on the river.

  In the louring, oppressive sky, thick with green clouds,

  Neither sun nor moon was visible.

  It was a land withered by age, lacking a single blade of grass.

  The shaman’s wife instinctively

  Knew that she had to cross the river if she wanted to see her dead husband again.

  But how on earth to cross a river where the water was high as a mountain and the current sharp as a blade, how to hazard her body in a river where gloomy lumps of rock were whirling like famished ghosts, oppressing her spirits.

  Just then, a human form walked out of the hut…

  No, crawled out.

  It was a man who had neither arms nor legs, only a head and a torso.

  His face was hideous as a wild boar, aged as a dead tree, cunning as a rat.

  He introduced himself as Abakal. Abakal made bells and masks; he had been doing so for generations.

  The masks he specialised in were those of a miracle-working bear, of iron clouds, of a storm of earth, of rain, and of a copper mirror,

  Whoever wore the respective mask would instantly become a miracle-working bear, iron clouds, a storm of earth, rain, or a copper mirror.

  People thought of him as a magician.

  In his younger days, believing that there was nothing to which this magic could not be applied, he’d had the idea to make the death mask of a departed spirit. A mask that would give him the power to call the dead spirits back to this world.

  One day he succeeded and, possessed by the spirit whom he had recalled, jumped into the river and lost all his limbs, becoming a cripple.

  Legend has it that this river will one day dry up without warning

  Exposing its bed of red stone; no one knows when that will happen, Abakal said.

  Though I became a monster, though my body became one that can love no woman

  and that no woman can love,

  In spite of that, I still have the power to summon departed spirits with a mask, Abakal continued.

  Abakal and the shaman’s wife went into his hut.

  Inside the hut, a space so cramped that two people filled it entirely,

  Thick green light that leaked in through the gaps in the stone walls formed a transparent lattice between them.

  On each wall of the hut hung masks which Abakal had made. There was the mask of an owl, the mask of an eagle, the mask of a bear, the mask of a wolf, the mask of a male goat.

  Abakal spoke again: I am also able to translate what the dead spirits whisper to me into human language.

  But no living human has listened to my words.

  Please, the shaman’s wife begged, tell them to me. I want to listen.

  You will live with me in this hut, Abakal said, looking up at the shaman’s wife from the floor.

  You will live with me in this hut.

  You will be my hands and my feet.

  You will be my bed, my sleeping place.

  You will bear six children of me.

  The first child will be born blind, the second child a deaf-mute, the third child will be born without arms, the fourth will have no legs. And the fifth child will be born a leper, their whole body covered in boils. The sixth child will be a healthy girl.

  You will love that child as your own eyes. And one day, the day red lightning strikes the earth, the day the mountains explode in a rain of fire and the river boils dry,

  You will leave this hut;

  You will dance lightly over the threshold without looking back;

  At that time you will not be alone.

  You will leave this hut with that child hidden in your skirt.

  You will leave me alone with my wretchedness.

  So I will rain down curses on you.

  Don’t curse me, cried the shaman’s wife, I promise I won’t take your child.

  What I am saying to you now is only what the departed spirits are whispering into my ears, Abakal answered.

  From that day they lived together as woman and man.

  According to Abakal’s prophecy, they had six children, one after another.

  The first child was blind, the second child was a deaf-mute, the third child had no arms, the fourth no legs. When the fifth child was born, the shaman’s wife had to pick off with her hands the fly larvae which covered its entire body, which clung to the boils, and sucked the discharge from them, before she could see whether the thing she had given birth to was a pouch of wriggling maggots or a living baby.

  The sixth child was a healthy, pretty daughter. The shaman’s wife recalled the curse Abakal had spoken of, and asked him what sort of a curse it was.

  If you leave me, this child will grow up and marry me in your place, he answered.

  And so become my hands and my feet, my bed and my sleeping place.

  And bear my children as blind, deaf and dumb, missing limbs, and afflicted with leprosy.

  The shaman’s wife was shocked. Surely that is too harsh a fate for such a pretty young child? she shouted. Think about it, when I myself first met you I was a very young woman, pretty as that child. But if I take this child away, won’t that in fact save her from such a fate?

  Look closely at my face, Abakal said, and something you do not yet know will rise up from the deep abyss of memory.

  The shaman’s wife gazed closely at his face,

  And saw that this was the father she had never met,

  Her flesh and blood father, who had abandoned her mother even before the child was born.

  Abakal said, now you understand.

  Since you have already taken that child and lef
t me, I will take the child as a wife.

  Just then, there was a roaring the like of which they had never heard before,

  The world shook and flaming lumps of stone began to rain down onto the earth.

  Red lightning struck the ground, the mountains exploded in a burst of fireworks, the water in the river gushed up to the sky and then boiled dry.

  Uncovered in the blink of an eye, the riverbed was an endless expanse of dried earth, scattered with rocks sharp as spearheads.

  Abakal’s hut crumbled down around them.

  Rocks tumbled onto Abakal’s body as he lay on the ground.

  He was being buried in a mountain of stones, screaming, dying. His face and torso became bloodied tatters. The offspring which had been born to them also became covered in blood. The filth and dark blood which covered their faces was like a sign that their existence was about to be erased.

  So the shaman’s wife knew that the time had come for her prophesied departure.

  She knew it was time to dance lightly away from Abakal’s hut, without looking back, as the words of the revelation had predicted.

  So that is what she did.

  Having made it through the heaps of sharp rocks littering the river bed, she arrived at the opposite bank and was immediately confronted by a huge bear. The bear knocked the shaman’s wife to the ground with a single swipe, tore through her flesh with its teeth and swallowed her up.