13

Session 6 (10/9 – 9.32 a.m.):

– It’s the name of a film, you must remember that
– No, I don’t, actually
– French film, 1930s, people drifting around on a river boat
some sort of love story
set just before the war, kind of idyllic, tragic-comic
you must have seen it somewhere, blanked it out
– A French film from the thirties? I think I’d remember that
– Maybe somebody told you about it
maybe you read it somewhere
who knows? In any case, that explains at least part of the dream

He doesn’t care to reveal the detail about the fork
no doubt there’ll be as little trouble with that
a shortlist of films with fork-stabbing scenes
learned disquisition on pop-cultural clichés
he can’t explain
though he keeps trying to
the extent to which this dream differs from all his others
the reality of it
the strange concrete precision of its details

Break-time’s over, back to the trenches
the students are sitting there ready for him
all except Jin-Soo, so often late these days
late because clumsily wooing
one of the girls from the beginners’ class
in any case
time & tide wait for no man
– Who can give me a good example of a proverb, a saying?
Helen? Hae-Yung?
– a stitch in time safe nine
– a stitch in time saves nine
& what does that mean?
& so they’re off