Crow's Eye View and Limbus Company
Poem No. 9, "Muzzle", Crow's Eye View poetry collection:
Every day was a spate of gusts and now a largish hand touches my waist. Just when the smell of my sweat seeps through the ecstatic vales of my fingerprints: fire. I shall fire. In my digestive tract I feel the stout gun barrel its slick muzzle kissing the back of my clenched teeth. Then at the moment I close my eyes for the blast just what have I spit in lieu of a bullet.
By Kim Hae-Gyeong (김해경). Pen name Yi Sang (이상)
There are two notes to make about this poem. The first is that it has been directly referenced prior to this, in the Solemn Lament Yi Sang's passive name:
Fire.IShallFire
I want to note this in relation to the EGO's mention of "My viscera", which carries the implication of shooting one's self, alongside the awakening line's "feeling of the gun barrel" (or in other words muzzle).
Now in order excluding the mentioned
This poetry collection has been referenced several times throughout the game, and i thought i would compile all the places that it has been referenced so far (and with a healthy dose of conjecture)
Note that i am aware these were written without spaces, however for the sake of being readable i wont be removing them.
Poem No. 1 "13 Children":
13 children speed toward the way. (For the road a blocked alley is apt.) The 1st child says it is scary. The 2nd child says it is scary. The 3rd child says it is scary. The 4th child says it is scary. The 5th child says it is scary. The 6th child says it is scary. The 7th child says it is scary. The 8th child says it is scary. The 9th child says it is scary. The 10th child says it is scary. The 11th child says it is scary. The 12th child says it is scary. The 13th child says it is scary. Among 13 children there are scary children and scared children and they are all they are. (It is better that there is no other excuse.) Of those it is fine to say that 1 child is scary. Of those it is fine to say that 2 children are scary. Of those it is fine to say that 2 children are scared. Of those it is fine to say that 1 child is scared. (For the road an opened one is apt.) It does not matter if 13 children do not speed toward the way.
This poem has been referenced a multitude (2) of times in different places.
The first is the use of the word children in the uptie stories, referencing the 13 children, as there are 13 sinnners (remember that dante is still a sinner, even if they have no ID's (yet)).
The second is during Yi Sang's Dimension Shredder Corrosion:
As a matter of fact, the alley is an open one
alongside its profile line being "open alley", in direct reference to the second line of the poem.
Poem No. 2:
When my father is dozing by me I become my father and I become my father’s father and even then my father is my father like my father so why do I keep becoming my father’s father’s father’s…father why must I jump over my father and why at last must I be acting out myself and my father and my father’s father’s and my father’s father’s father’s roles all at the same time staying alive
This one will return in later mention.
Poem No. 4:
This above poem is a symbology of death, the geometric sequences all ending at zero, reaching their terminus. This relates to Hae-Gyeong's tuberculosis, which would eventually kill him.
Poem No. 5:
Relating back to, but not being the origin of, Yi Sang's motif of the "Wings".
Alongside Poem no. 2, this relates back to the concept of stagnation in ones life.
Poem no. 10. "Butterfly":
In the tattered wallpaper I see a dying butterfly. It’s a secretive mouthpiece a hotline to the other world. One day in my glassed beard I see a dying butterfly withered and feeding on the poor dew that respiration makes. If I die with my palm over the mouthpiece the butterfly too shall spring away. Words like these are never to be let out.
This is the inspiration for the abnormality named "Funeral of a Dying Butterfly" within the mirror dungeon, and arguably the "Funeral of Dead Butterflies" in games prior.
The second is the line "ISeeTheDyingButterfly" in the Solemn Lament ID itself. One could consider the fact that Yi Sang received this ID in itself a reference.
Trigger warning: mentions of suicide and self harm in the proceeding section, read with caution
Poem No. 15:
1 I find myself in an interior with no mirror. Me-in-the-mirror has surely gone out. For fear of him I tremble. From where and how does this sinister figure machinate against me. 2 In a cooled bed I slept cradling a crime. I was absent in my certain dream and my military boots which held prosthetics soiled my dream’s blank sheets. 3 I steal into an interior with a mirror. To release me from the mirror. But crestfallen and without fail he too and in sync enters. Bestows his regret upon me. Imprisoned by me as I am by him me-in-the-mirror too trembles. 4 My dream where I am absent. My mirror where my counterfeit does not appear. Yearner for my solitude to whom even incompetence is OK. Finally I have decided to prescribe suicide to him. I indicate the awning window which does not even have a view. The sole purpose of that window is suicide. But he cannot go before I kill myself he instructs me. Me-in-the-mirror is almost a deathless bird. 5 I occulted my heart with metal held the pistol up to the mirror and aiming leftward the chest pulled the trigger. The bullet dug into where his heart should be but his heart is to the right. 6 Crimson ink spilled out from the carbon heart. In my dream to which I am late I’ve been sentenced to capital punishment. It is not I who rules my dreams. I am guilty of a grave crime for holding captive the very two who cannot even shake hands.
The largest and most obvious reference that can be drawn from this is the "me in the mirror" relating back to canto 4 and Yi sang's relation to mirrors as a whole.
The second, in stanza (the term for a paragraph in a poem) 5, can be linked back to Fell Bullet, once again relating to the bullet piercing the heart that was present in the story of the Freischutz, however the failure of this to kill, or take Yi Sang's soul.
the 6th stanza is also interesting for its relation to both dreams, alongside its relation to handshakes. One could relate this to the abnormality "handshake of handshakes" or alternatively "Wandering Mind" (source of Wrist Guards and Phantom Pain respectfully), however, in Poem
