Leaves of home (Variation 3) by Joonhee Myung (JUNOS)
Bugs
When it’s warm
I’ll press my back against the shade
our skin stiff as citrus peel
moisture veiling us from chatter
and the supplicating screams
of bored out souls
with squinting eyes
just a few footsteps away
the music keeps stopping and getting
caught in my hair
yet everything’ll be beautiful
and perfectly serene
this time around we’ll sit
on the tablecloth among crusty
dishes left by friends
who took too long to depart
we’ll forget about them
and progress to new games
hiding again
for no reason at all
you’ll need sturdy shoes for this one
and bugs will go wild
in the night
even stone will collapse
under their weight but
I won’t be here long enough
to help cleaning up.
(walk-in closet)
i
On the top shelf
300 guests on the dusty pink sofa
are watching the film
and you are one of them
wearing your crude
polite flowers which are not
for me today
ii
On the first shelf down
is virgin country gathering dust.
The party’s long crumbled
or is about to begin
Only lone brooch we could take downstairs
where they don’t know our names and our faces too well
but sometimes we don’t like that
iii
White knee-high socks to play sax
while the rest of the world is quiet
and them talking too loudly next door
We wouldn’t know what to say either way
your immediate future is so far away
but mine is so close and so fleshy
and so heavy to shake
The skirt’s getting dirty at the bottom
I once touched this
dress in the park
tan leather branches between us
and consciousness a mess
sequins
sparked
alight “enjoy
at once the
horizon”
when we all
parted without
breathing
sweet floral science got murdered today. Silk spoiled and hesitation heard across the void.
In feverish duality time repeats itself and yet
youhaven’t put this on in so many years.
Youth.
Madness.
Ecstasy, perhaps?
Sacred hunters of hallucination & everyone blooms
of course, pale shoes get dirty as fast as any other shoe. It’s just more noticeable when they blush.
About the author:
Originally from Milan, Rosa Crepax lives, writes and teaches in London. She has a PhD from Goldsmiths University and lectures in critical and cultural studies. Her poetry has received Pushcart and Best of Net nominations, and appears or is forthcoming in Hobart, Spoon River Poetry Review, Ghost City Review, The Good Life Review, LEON Literary Review, 3:AM Magazine, The Harvard Advocate, Grain Magazine, Quarter After Eight, Harpur Palate and others. Her first collection will be published by Death of Workers Whilst Building Skyscrapers (small press).
In the artist’s words:
Joonhee Myung (Junos): My work explores the intersections of abstraction, memory, and mythology, weaving digital and organic forms into layered compositions. Each image captures a dialogue between ephemeral textures and fragmented landscapes, reflecting themes of hybridity, displacement, and transformation.
Leaves of home (Variation 3) blends photography, digital painting, and experimental layering techniques to evoke a sense of movement and liminality. It is part of an ongoing visual narrative where nature, personal history, and the subconscious merge into fluid dreamscapes.
Myung graduated from Yonsei University with a bachelor’s degree in Russian Language and Literature/Political Diplomacy, and speaks four languages: English, Russian, Spanish, and French. She has participated in group exhibitions and film festivals such as the 2023 Artists for Climate (Seoul, Korea), and the 2022 Vitafest Short Film Festival Vitacura (online – Santiago, Chile).
In 2023, she moved into the Haengam Arts Center in Changwon, South Korea, and devoted herself to her work, winning the poetry category at the 2024 Seoul Subway contest, as well as the United Kingdom’s Global Talent Art Prize’s Photography Special Award, and Canada’s Pebbles Underground Media Art Film Festival’s Audience Award.