The Illness Narratives
Won Jin Choi
All texts are shown in their original language.
what you can do, is stop typing from now on, wash your face, and pee, before hitting the road.
[…]
Dans le cadre de l’exposition Nos Corps Anarchiques (2023) curatée par Georgia René-Worms, j’ai réalisé une publication DIY, à la couverture en cuir perforée de trous et de “piercings”. À l’intérieur, les fragments d’une partie d’un journal post-opératoire écrit entre 2021 et 2022, formant ainsi un ensemble de courts textes. Cela pouvait ressembler à des poèmes, mais ça n’a jamais été mon intention. J’écrivais un journal sans forme précise. Ces phrases n’étaient pas tout à fait des secrets, mais elles n’étaient pas non plus entièrement destinées au monde.
[…]
Aujourd’hui, je navigue différemment, tout comme la manière dont je me déplace dans le monde. Je pense moins à la dichotomie d’un début et d’une fin, car je vois désormais que ces frontières ne sont pas aussi fermes que je le croyais. La maladie, comme toute autre partie de l’existence, déborde dans le monde.
[...]
J'écris ce texte et je me demande si maintenant je devais à nouveau partager cette œuvre, ce que cela signifierait. L'objet lui-même doit être quelque part dans ma bibliothèque, ou peut-être rangé dans un classeur d'archives de mes expositions. ... Le passage du temps, avec ses inévitables changements, a modifié ma relation au texte, à la maladie et à l'acte même de partager un bout de quelque chose d'aussi intime.
[...]


Extrait de Post (Post-op(2021-2022), 2023), (2024)
from: Won Jin Choi
to: Laurie Charles
date: Dec 3, 2024, 5:42 PM
subject: Re: Partager un morceau de ton livre
Untitled
The first pain i remember
Was a paper cut on my sixth or seventh birthday The gift I had was three series of books Extremely brand new
It was an exact gift I wanted
So I eagerly opened them
Pages were so freshly cut
I got a cut on my whole entire ring finger
That was the first real pain I remember
Even if I got extremely scared of
a sheet of paper
I still dreamt to be a bookstore owner
The first pain of my life
Was a paper cut from a favorite book
Untitled
Gagarin m’a dit once, keep your head up high and don’t lose your faith. Why do you question so many things that others don’t even care? Why does it take you so long to choose your words?
Why can’t you sleep at night without having a smoke?

There’s a courgette in the frigo, la courgette est fatiguée.

Bottle of water in front of your eyes, The water is not blue at all,
Riddles are made to be solved, drink the seawater and go to bed. Trumpet goes off, and the party starts Me dancing without my feet scratching the tip of my brows
but the dance, the joyful dance doesn’t have the music involved.
Untitled
The sandcastle I built
all along my beach
condensed sand fortress mixte with soft shell took me some time to be built
to resist against the current
gets easily washed away
when
I get to grasp
the weakness
of others
by accident
before
even seeing
mine
the weakness
of others
are the strongest waves
that washes away
the walls of the sandcastle
I built
against the current
for years and years I sometimes
find myself left alone in the
remaining bubbles amongst the ruins They don’t just get washed away
they melt away through all my fingertips until everything gets dissolved including myself
An expert
of the masterized pity fuck
that eventually crushes
everything behind the walls
including myself
Becoming the witness of
the weakness of others
some call it a sickness
getting weakened by the weakness
but i don’t know any better
other than to stay weakened
by the weakness of others
Magic
My hair’s now long enough to carry both dust and stardust. Both of them got tangled in my long locks
And the magic would happen sometimes
while dragging them all around It would sometimes get in the way of mine of liking what I hate and hating what I like, Like
digging my fingers into greasy curls or
finding one of those on my bathroom wall,
sometimes.
I didn’t like the hat worn on that particular day,
nor seeing that sweat stain under armpits, the other day, Now I want them pair of ivory colored sneakers
to be ruined.

That's exactly where the magic is, because now, I,
absolutely do not believe in them, and got to say only
I
throughout this entire text.
A mermaid walk
She smelled like a lavender A carrot
An orange peel
Some lemon zest
And a lot like a cinnamon soap
Every time when she passed by
I couldn’t help but stare at her
On one hand she held a broken plate
On the other hand, a deck of cards Credit card always held between her lips I’d call her a mermaid with legs A tiny mole on her neck
I wondered what she will buy today
She spilled the coffee on the floor
Imagining I was there waiting for her
Honestly that was something so sweet
I dug a hole and climbed down the ladder
I couldn’t help but sing a song
Under the persimmon tree
Wearing a black jacket
And a pair of white wool socks
Finally she turned around
And slowly walked away
Her knees were so light
Her ankles were made out of strings
Thighs of a chocolate dipped cherry
Calves I wanted to lick and bite day and night
She was going to return to the sea
Between waves of vodka where her hair won’t catch fire
contributions
The Illness Narratives
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Georgia René-Worms
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what you can do, is stop typing from now on,
wash your face, and
pee, before hitting the road.
Won Jin Choi