Petals Trodden, 2023
Mixed media
30" x 30"

 

Flowers plucked and trampled
Never again to bloom
Will they blossom in afterlife

Their only sin crossing the river to fill their stomach
Following a stranger’s promise for work at a factory
Little flowers of North Korea being sold away
Stolen away somewhere within China's treacherous peaks
Shackled down like animals
Trampled and trampled again

Quivering, unable even to whimper
Will this hell ever end.

- Gongsan Kim