Calliope: Epic Poetry Summary

Mother is eighteen years old and was born in Yong Jung, Manchuria. Although she now lives in China, she is Korean. Her parents moved to China to escape the Japanese occupation in Korea. She lives in a village with other Korean refugees on land that is not her own. She no longer wants to see what they do to her people. She suffers having left Korea though her spirit has not left; her spirit is not in the past but burns. She is a child still at eighteen years old. She has been ill and sheltered for her entire life. Mother speaks the mandatory language because her native tongue is forbidden, but she secretly speaks her mother tongue in the dark; it is her refuge and a way to return home. Speaking saddens her since each word means risking...