THE PHONG
ASIAN MORNING
WESTERN MUSIC
and Other Poems
Preface by
LLOYD FERNANDO
Professor of English, University of Malaya
DAI NAM
Saigon, South Vietnam, 1971.
FIRST PUBLISHED BY DAI NAM
Printed in South Vietnam
All rights in whole or partial reproduction and adaption
reserved for all countries. Printed in Vietnam
Cover Design
H.E. SULAIMAN ESA
Translated from the Vietnamese by
DAM XUAN CAN
Preface
The agony of Vietnam My Lai as a pointer to the mindless savagery of his prolonged conflict. How does the common Vietnamese man or woman see it ? One steady, brave, lone voice – that of Thephong – comes through to give us an inkling. There surely must be others. Now that the nations of South East Asia are coming unsentimentally, close together, these others must also soon be heard. Meanwhile there is Thephong, I am competent to make an overall assessment of Thephong’s qualities as a writer, chiefly because I know his work only through English translation. But even in translation the voice does come through. Here is no poseur, no literary dilettante. In Thephong’s words, he writes simply because he cannot escape doing so. He is against those who would “ use literature in the same way as bar hostesses do”. In “ Truoc Mat Nhin Thi Si” ( Under the Poet’s Eyes) , he declares:
The million lines of poetry which can become
directives for this nation in the future
Should be preceded by the million lines of poetry
cataloguing the hardship of to-day…
His poetry, like his prose, is deeply committed, passionate, and supremely just. Even as he rails at the barbarouness of the American presence, he never forgets their true centre in Abraham Linclon and John Fitzgerald. Kennedy. He records with baleful eyes the havoc wreaked in the name of protection by outsiders who must genuinely have thought, at one time, they were there only to help. Thephong’s poetry is committed poetry of the best kind. As the vignettes succeed one another we realize we are witnessing a convincing demonstration of how the road to hell is paved with good intentions.
There must be something deeply wrong with the kind of help and protection which calls for
550.000 G.I.’s in Vietnam
generous – unwittingly fallen. Why has it taken them so long to learn that protection in the post- colonial era is simply colonialism an a new guise ? ( Assistance between equals, of course, is another matter ). No mistakes the Vietnamese could have made in the name of protection. Everybody
who thinks himself advanced and knowledgeable has one last most diffcult lesson yet to learn : no matter how helful he may think he can be, he must not step in and try to show others how to run their affairs ; he too must learn superhuman patience.
Thephong’s poems are dramatizations of the Vietnamese consciouness from the well of such thoughts. The poems are monologues, thoughtful efforts to discover both sense and kindness in the surrounding madness. The result is perhaps prolix sometimes, but that is a fault of h
generosity. His detail, through counterpointing, is compassionate to both victim and helper. One can be restrained simply by refusing to look. Thephong looks fearlessly, and still can be restrained. Even in the midst of their inferno the Vietnamese cand find voices like Thephong’s - that is the wonder. His fearless restraint, so much in evidence in their poems, is a most movinglesson for non-Vietnamese readers everywhere. []
LLOYD FERNANDO
Professor of English,
Dept. of English
Proud to be a Vietnamese
You are a Vietnamese soldier. Be proud
The unbreakable flow of bullets and rockets bruises you, staggers you,
singing the praises
You are a beast of burden. Can you not love your country then?
Do not envy anyone
even if you have to live at subsistence level
Americans are a special lot. They are stinking with money, their arsenal
is fantastic…
Do you believe
that the pay of all of us, including yours
comes from their treasure ?
Just as one single dollar is worth more than two hundred Vietnamese piasters
So a single word from the adviser-cum-master carries more weight than
a hell lot our ideas
In the battlefields we shed blood
so that our just cause will prevail some day
I say this
although I am pretty sick of hollow words like peace,
independence, and freedom
I also know the two Vietnams
We cannot control our own fate or that of our country.
This is because
we are poor and hungry
we are weak and powerless
Even if we are chained race
we ought to be proud
Be apologetic to the Allied advisers
even when they are to blame
Forget the frustations and sufferings of over twenty years of war
Forget your own youth of scars
I know this
and I ask you never to utter a cry
never, never …
Don’t be shaken by the reporter who wrote in sorrow
“… In Cam Ranh the Allied MP’s stripped Vietnamese girls to search for
smuggled goods
We accept their right of search, but can you explain to me..
Why they tore down bras and slips , and why they outraged our national flag…”
Close your eyes
forget it
pretend not to see anything
You know damn well you are not in a position to do anything about it
Of course you may blush for the weakness of your countrymen
These days we are worse then beasts, would you believe it ?
( A beast does not stand idle while its mate or partner is bullied . )
We all knew this in kindergarten textbooks of good conduct .
Right! Right! We are no longer ourselves in our country
I still ask you to be proud to be a Vietnamese
our country will know its day
Our people are tired of endless suffering. Come and ruleover us, O peace!
Of our friends
count the dead
and count the living
Do not forget those who died unburied, do not let them die for nothing
Do not believe an American militiaman
fights because of his goddam salary
None of us can ever bring ourselves to be mercenaries…
Be assured ! This land of ours
impoverished today
will be plentiful in mineral ores
The stratofortresses are doing just that for us, apart from other thing
which I hate to tell you about.
When they come
the mighty earth shakes violently, ceaselessly
As if under the spell of the macabre music you hear in churches on Sundays.
I ask you, our sworn enemies, to be proud
that after twenty years of terrible war
You still stand on your feet
while the stratofortresses rain millions of tons of bombs and rockets
You deserve to be called true heroes of endurance.
I never question this
I only ask you to open your eyes wide enough
To see your country
being reduced to a happy hunting ground
Should we resign ourselves to this
until doomsday ?
It is not strange
that today, today
there are more G.I.’s in Vietnam than in America
It is not fair
to ask
whether the end of the ordeal is near?
No matter how you feel
do not go all funny
do not show resentment to Allied soldiers
This bunch of whites, browns, blacks and reds
come here to our rescue !
They brought with them
flour
corned beef
and plastic wrapped goods
They are right if you remember our ancestral enemies
the goddam Chinese
Are ready at all times to march in to force domination upon us
It won’t not take lon because they are right at our doorstep
Do not be galled by the sight of boards reading :
“ No Admittance to Locals”
My friend
bury your face in your hands then cast a long glance at the sea
And the mountains and forests and meadows and streams. This country is ours .
O when will you country cease to be “ a baby in the arms of the American nurse”
When will regain its place as the second rice exporter in the world…
I have been in every corner of my country
Wherever I was I could not help the pang in my heart
It is painful to know
we are no longer able to feed ourselves
Every bullet
every toilet roll
every piece of corrugated iron
every “piaster “of your salary
Does not come from our land
Do not go all funny, man
mountainous sorrow will make you a philosopher
Before long
we will have no taste left for romantic literature
Instead we will write treatises on human despair.
I know you
do not want to hear any more talk about it…
I only want to tell you
Do not let the foreigners whores your wives
Do not approve of mixed marriage
however justified the motive
Educate your children
on the hardships and misfortunes of today
( To live in suffering is to deserve to live)
When you go out in the streets
when you are on operations in the countryside
Try to protect our women and girls.
Do not act like cursed strangers
( Nobody can afford to be a foreigner in his own country )
Cool down man
when you are taken as undesirable background in photographs
When you see Yanks coming out of the PX all smiles
Cool down man
When you have not enough to live on
it goes without saying
You should refrain from buying gifts for you girl friend of your own race.
What a Sight, 550,000 G.I.’ s in Vietnam
Well ! Well !
Our friends
The Americans have arrived in our country.
They have manpower ,
They have money,
They have munitions
( the recipes of the magic formulas )
And there are 550,000 of them.
Deserted places
become military bases
Petrified,
Stupefied,
we Vietnamese see American establishments mushrooming :
Cam Ranh Bay, Cam Ranh Air Base, Cam Ranh City
Quy Nhơn, Chu Lai, Tân Sơn Nhât, Biên Hòa…
Anywhere they set foot
they are followed by our women and girls
the fun makers par excellence
As for you
You must produce passes
when you come down to any these places
Don’t you see signboards
reading : “ Locals keep out “
I know how you feel
but don’t let patriotism wall you in
( And I need not tell you true love defies petty jealousy .
In order not to be mad
keep telling yourself
We must choose between the lesser of the two evils
namely the Chinese and the Americans
We all cherish
the freedom of profession
the freedom of life
and the freedom to die of starvation
I urge you to banish all sombre thoughts
which only cloud your knowledge of the real situation of our country.
Do you know
what Vietnam
Of irrelevant Western-style democracy and phony socialist forces
We
have been paying
for this
all our lives
but not to avail…
Without respite
day and night
our country exposes itself
to rockets and bombs
Hundreds of raids are being carried out daily
How many have died ?
We don’t know
the dead never asked to be counted
or even to be remembered
We can only be sure of one thing :
we will not never suffer from overpopulation.
For the survivors
each grain of rice we eat
is imported from vast fields in California
but they era doing all right
While we are to suffer in the most cruel and obscene way
What an irony !
I ‘ve been walking all roads of the bellowed land
including footpaths
One afternoon when I stopped, terribly hungry
What have I tell you ?
Where I can ask
for a clean breathing space ?
In thousands of bars from muddy Pleiku, Kontum ,
to dusty Nha Trang, Đà Nẵng ,
Our girls brazenly ply their trade with sex-straved G.I.’s
Coloreds !
Whites !
Reds !
Blacks !
Democarcy protectors !
I have seen them all !
Right ! Right !
They are always right with women !
Lovers of a quick buck
our girls are not to bad
after all !
A Negro G.I. always showers dollar notes on the girl he sleeps with
He pays double everywhere
starting from the brothel !
( He does so out of frustration with his white colleagues )
Man to man
I do not object to them
What troubles m
is the fact there are indecent women .
Do you see
my friend
“ special” advertisements inserted in English language dailies ?
With one hundred dollars
one third of the montly salary of a G.I.
you can buy two girls from good Vietnamese families
The color of your skin
does not really matter .
O my God !
I know of a family with two girls .
For reasons that I dare not elaborate
The elder sister set out to make love with one G.I. after another
She soon become unfit
and bed-ridden
Her younger sister cried loud
sinking into the deepening darkness.
On the following morning
a G.I. turned up
saying he wanted his money back
He was simply not satisfied
he had not got the right value for his money.
How the hell could I believe it ?
The frail younger sister hurried to follow him
To a dingy hotel room
in stormy weather
Her parents lost news of her in a month.
until one sad evening
The same G.I. appeared
to ask them to come to the 3rd Field Hospital
to claim her corpse
her face pallid .
She was the wife of a Vietnamese soldier
They were with each other only two days
Out of two years of married life ( You must find this hard to understand ).
His battalion fought
at Khe Sanh
Lang Vei
and A Shau
He was the only survivor of a whole platoon
he was allowed to come home this time
Nobody dared to tell him the cause of her death
he would not believe it anyway
But for him
she was as dead as an any other dead person
he did not need to know anymore .
We have got
Even in Tân Sơn Nhât
the main strip has got a foreign name.
We are living in our own land
And we feel estranged
as if we are yellow Negroes.
Today
the 22nd October 1968
The radio announced
the change of color
of the MPC’ * took effect since yesterday
I agree completely
I have unreserved praise
for this just measure
But what did I see
Since seven this morning
a stream of sad-faced women and girls
Cramming the road to Tân Son Nhât Airport
to present a petition
Their property
their savings
their payments for “ services”
had come to nothing…
In an office there was a Vietnamese woman
whose officer husband was away;
She had a very cute son
he could mumble a few words.
He wept and screamed
scared of his mother’s American visitors
Unlike her ,
he was not a bit impressed by dollars;
Shaking his head
shouting louder,
broken in tears,
he called his father’s name .
Alas
his father had long been denied leave
Now he was leading his troops against the enemy in the highlands.
The woman worked for Americans
to get money ,
and that would be that - she thought -
The kinky American officer who employed her thought a bit differently,
He said :
“ I will help you ,
you husband is an Army officer
he is my best friend …“
Not long after that
he fell madly in love with her.
One rainy evening
he proposed to drive her home
It rained,
it rained ,
The car ran smoothly on the road
when suddenly he pressed the brake pedal.
The car didn’t overturn
but she was trapped squarely on his lap .
Holding her tight
in his two hairy arms
he kissed her savagely
raped her in the back seat.
He gave her all the MPC’s
he had
a lot of money .
That night
her child go to bed early,
Unaware the officer had taken the place of his father.
in the bed of his parents
The son went top bed early
unaware the officer had taken the place of his father in the ebd of his parents
The next morning
he got up
amazed to see so many MPC’s
He did not like them
and tore them to pieces
calling to his mother
Startled
she rushed to him
handed him a parcel of candies
Telling him it was from his father in the war zone.
Jubilant
he held it tight
mumbling his father’s name
Dead tired
after a hellish night of love
she did not bother to go to work
Stretching her shoulders
half smiling
she looked at her bed filled with MPC’s
All this from the work of a single night,
now she had become a millionairess
She summoned the household
handing out to them all Vietnamese notes left
The 500 piaster note with hero Trần Hưng Đạo On
The 200 piaster note with the hero Quang Trung On
The 100 piaster note with Lê Văn Duyệt On
She said:
“..I give you all these cheap things,
I do not want them anymore,
they are very, very cheap…”
Today
The 22nd October 1968
she came to work
read about it all in the newspapers
Two days previously,
the American authorities announced the change of color of the MPC’s
She wanted to cry
her dream of wealth
remained a dream .
She was taken to the hospital
After swallowing an overdose of sleeping pille
And she refused to be brought home
for fear of seeing the worthless pile of dollars
She broke down again
Those around her thought her lelirious
When they heard her speaking English to herself :
“…Go home !
Go home !
The Yankee
I disliked…”
Today I went out ,
the roads now are as good as the highways in the States.
I felt gratified to the R.M.K.,
and the U.S Army, financed road reconstruction program .
Today I went out ,
and I bad a strange feeling ,
it was not election time ;
But I saw ,
NIXON- AGNEW posters everywhere
I was confused beyond words .
I want to ask them what they think ?
the soldier whose wife died in the hospital ;
exhausted from making lve with the G.I.’s ,
the officer whose wife became delirious after losing “ hard earned” money .
I have a further question ,
to ask good man like Bernard Fall ;
Who wrote “The two Vietnams “
discussing problems in both the North
and the South
And died
on Vietnamese soil ,
in the field trip,
with the U.S. Marines in Quảng Trị Province
I want to ask good Americans
like the U.S.
Who tried to learn about us and to do good thing in the name of Christ .
You are people of wisdom ,
people of strength ;
But you are honest enough
To admit the stupid mistakes your fellow countrymen committed
in the name of friendship ?
I for one cannot entertain
the prospect of our girls becoming prostitutes and boys pimps .
This land of ours counts on you ,
Men who are not Communists ,
Men who have convictions ,
Men who are not servants ,
Men who have dignity ,
Men who do not allow wives to work for Americans ,
Men who bring salvation
I know you will feel humiliated .
I tell you
You must learn American
If you want to know
What the hell going on …
(* : Military Payment Certificates ( MPC’s) are issued to service-men as currency for military- operated facilities and services provided in Vietnam. They are issyed in lieu of “ the green dollar”.
JOHN FITZGERALD KENNEDY .
In a whole evening ,
I wander
casting a glance
at the sea
and the horizon
counting every quarter of an hour
while the sun appears and disappears
on the waves .
my secret sadness
refuses to go
I wonder whether there is any meaning in life
in the wood Our Lady with innumerable pebbles
in this place I find no solace at all
The sea today is sad like me ,
furious waves do not cease rolling
and breaking on lonely rocks .
And rocks seem
to be shattered to pieces of russet color ,
thousand of years ago ;
at the beginning of the universe .
Probably this hill was part of the sea ,
with billows roaring .
after so long a time ,
now a lone man ,
I walk slowly, sadly ;
up and down this place ,
visit friends and inanimate things ;
and then depart once more …
Sitting in the evening shop waiting to be served ,
looking at nude pictures on the wall ;
and hearing Western music .
Suddenly I realize
Christmas is coming soon ,
in this war-ravaged land .
The hostess after collecting money
leaves the counter ;
goes into the kitchen
to prepare roast fish .
yesterday the duty cook
went to the training camp ;
woman replace men in all matters ;
except for being husbands .
I begin to weep
over my lonely state.
O my love
are you happy away from me
today
for dinner
I will eat more
thinking of your beautiful hands and body .
I’ll smile in tears .
Do you know
in this time of civil we all have burning pains
let us turn away
not to see the obscene scene .
A naked G.I.
shows his contempt for prostitutes ;
by going out of the the bathroom
without a dress on .
A wife turns away
looks ,
at her husband ,
and waits for him to react
head bowed ;
he goes on sipping his soft drink
aware that the blue-eye soldier
thinks all Vietnamese women;
are keen on seeing naked bodies .
In fact
his beastly attitude should only shame
compatriote of hero Abraham Lincoln ,
whose statue was carved on a great mountain .
As for me
I remember the photo of John F. Kennedy,
hero of the world with floating hair ;
assassinated not long ago .
Since then Vietnamese youths
night after night ,
look at his picture hung over the bed ;
feel respect and love for him
champion of “ New Frontier Policy “.
O the obscene jingle full of pretty things
makes only prostitutes laugh
I will never forget the morning
I came to the cage-like shop ;
surrounded by wires for fear of terrorist activities .
there were four at the table
three Americans and a Viet woman
they seemed to be gallant like Europeans .
I sincerely thought so
until the little waiter brought
a small plate full of cheese ;
he stuttered in front of an American ,
“ she orders this
Gentleman ;
why you shake your head ? “
not knowing what had happened !
The Viet prostitute
went on laughing and talking ,
even after she admitted
she had ordered this extra thing .
Her lover still shook his head .
I felt sorry although
I had breakfast twice,
now I know another characteristic
of a leading nation in the world !
the American woman has her own purse ,
even after she is married .
this Viet woman,
the prostitute turned temporary
and profitable wife
has no money,
and has begged for a breakfast in vain .
The memory of the G.I.
opening the door of the bathroom ,
to let woman appraise his body aches me
for him Amerianism simply means this miserable husband ,
with gold-rimmed spectacles
walks in the direction of the G.I.
and speaks softly as if saying prayers .
I at first take him to be a pimp
but after the quarrel breaks out.
I understand the weeping woman is his legitimate wife
For one afternoon
she had left Saigon for the fresh sea air
but only to feel all the humiliation of her people !
After the G.I. gets out to consult his friends
on how to right his grievous wrong ;
he walks in
the red cap on his head,
losing his arrogance
he say softly :
“ ..I am sorry I’m really sorry “.
please accept my apologies..!”
then a firm handshake with the husband
as an acknowledgement of friendship ,
like the handshake insigna printed on aid bags :
“ I’ m sorry
for thinking all Viet women are prostitutes
and dollars could buy everything …”
Still another story
every time the interpreter goes on leave ,
he sees on the highway
a love-starved G.I. simply brandishing his dollar coin
to find woman he could go ahead with .
In my war-torn land
every night flares shine bright in every corner of the country,
deafening sounds of artillery disturb further ;
uneasy sleeps of war-weary people .
never I found the image of any man
more shinning than J.K. Kennedy’s !
Now his image
fades out as bubbles ,
on the immensity of water ;
the wind in his hair
he seems to weep !
At the J.F. Kennedy Square in Saigon
the man whose wife was mistaken ,
as a prostitute ;
by a man of J.F. Kennedy’s nationality !
cannot find back his bitter tears
Christmas night ;
stars are shinning brightly
on the Saigon Basilica .
Eveything is shrouded in the fog of shame :
War !
and
War … !
Cap Saint Jacques ,
21st December, 1965.
Asian Morning, Western Music
to VŨ THỊ TỴ
This morning like any other morning
I open my eyes,
stretch to greet the flamered sunrays
which have burned the rancour in me for thirty years .
love now is sweet sour and bitter
my lips but still hold a pimento fruit ,
I cannot remain thoughtl
before the big cup of black coffee ,
part of our diet in the barrack ;
looking at my lean silhouette , on the hot sands !
I sadly think only my only amusement is eating rice
dearer to me than my sweethherat’s caresses ,
let me live more days of despair and sweat ,
hour by hour my people are increasingly ,
suffering the war fever,
in the sound and fury of mortar fire, tanks and jet-fighters !
rosy lips of beautiful women glisten amidst war !
a young soldier ruins his future ,
with the hostess in the café on the beach too keen on betrayal ,
watching her guests with experienced eyes
she orders drinks on their behalf ;
what will be left to us after years of war
countless rosy lipped youths have died to preserve these bright eyes of yours .
I am but a perfect stranger
last night ,
I lived to my utmost .
this morning I feel ten years older .
beautiful love is love in the morning
love late in the night is nasty.
the European female singer with passionate voice ,
makes me feel like crying ,
tapping the thin female dog lying at the road side
A G.I. pushes the door in
while I am sitting at this table to write verse ,
to bury sad days.
the mountain not far from me has witnessed ,
the twenty-year long desultory war
1943
Japanese troops dug trenches for ammunition .
1965
American troops rushed to Vietnam
… with the ball point pen ,
I write line after line
on the sea at Vũng Tàu are ships and carriers .
last night
there was a hilarious party
for Vietnam , U.S. , New Zealand , Australia
Free China and South South Korea ;
this is why
I am often mistaken for another even by a South Korean girl :
“ I am a Vietnamese, I am not a Korean …”
my skin is yellow ,
and I want to defend my country
like any of my friends of other races .
I look in her eyes ,
as if to tell her;
we shoud put old conflicts out of our mind
and carry on a new life for all of us !
the European singer‘s voice has shattered me
in Vũng Tàu five years ago .
O sweet memory always dear to me ,
it has been flooding back into my consciouness .
to me any Vietnamese girl is lovable !
this is precisely
why I worry
because weeping cadets
torment me prior to their time of departure .
O young soldiers !
you will go and I will stay in this training camp ;
for how long I cannot tell
after your departure ,
head down
I cry my eyes out
on account of communion the iron bed sweats .
nothing is more precious than highly exalted love !
between youths of twenty and thirty ;
Who swear to live and die together !
who meet amidst the fury of fire ,
as none will bathe twice ;
in the same river !
we will never meet again ,
like this - the graduation on the sand !
Dunes and hills crumble away ,
and the moon shines not for our enjoymwent .
after your departure
I look around
in the studying, eating , and sleeping rooms ;
there is nothing left;
on the floor,
but desks, and chairs and rubbish !
there are women to entertain us for a moment !
but I count on you
so that later on when I become and old man
leaning on a stick ;
I will sing of memories as a young man.
O youths dying with heads broken ,
where is peace that we will long for
later
of course ; I can’t meet all of you .
an army is complete
only before the battle,
who will be missing .
O my dear borthers, my loves one !
Bird’s warblings in the morning in the dreamlike coffee-arabica flower garden ,
dry brown terminalia leaves grace the pebble- covered lanes in the park.
an old man with white hair and beard
walking past ,
leaning on the stick is myself;
in after years.
sad sound of music begin wounding my heart ,
I pray, I pray
I pray, I pray
so that everything will be in right !
and the rosy lips of the bar hostess will not hasten to fade ,
the lamps in the room will remain lighted .
these things, however trivial
all contribute to our happiness !
O my love
I am in the sulks on account ,
of you not so sincere words;
thought it is my understanding ,
women speak these in spite of themselves .
O young lovers of tomorrow
do understand that insincerity is part of the love play;
the Siamese cat with yellow fur lies in the sun,
makes me think of a loving hand’s caresses .
you are walking in my heart .
I’ll surely love our first child ,
whether son or daughter ;
without you
how miserable I am
you still remember don’t you ?
the golden afternoon you sat by my side;
the setting sun
partly hidden by my helmet ;
my sunny smile is for you
in lieu of suffering people
love , though noble, is very selfish !
but what I can do ,
when I am but a man
at thirty I love you !
my love as ripe as bananas with tart-shaped dots .
When autumn comes Hanoians have tears in their eyes ,
I met and loved you at Saigon and Vũng Tàu ,
the sadly wind of the sea has been the witness of our love ;
we ‘ll pass another winter
but don’t you see spring is coming round again ;
and very soon
nature will be renewed ;
like our love today !
we’ll be happy !
we’ll be sad !
my love, do not feel more rancour ;
the heritage of us two
in years of despair.
O my love my love
in order to break our solitude ;
let us cry more
and strengthen our love !
O my love , my love
without me
will you cry ?
O my love , my love
without you
what is left to me ?
and how I can go on writing
to contribute to our literary heritage ;
lines of poetry
of bitter mornings and afternoons .
surely our country
will lost a poet
“ with the name Thephong !”
the sun has risen high
and is shining straight,
into my eyes
music is also fading away
in the morning café .
Cap Saint Jacques
23nd November, 1965.
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THE END
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THEPHONG
UPLIPTING POEMS
translated from the Vietnamese by
DAM XUAN CAN
DAI NAM
FIRST PUBLISHED BY DAI NAM
Printed in South Vietnam Saigon , 1974
All rights in whole or partial reproduction and adaption reserved
for all countries .
Cover Design
VI Y
Translated fron the Vietnamese by DAM XUAN CAN
Original tittle :
THƠ LÀM LỚN DẬY CON NGƯỜi
Đại Nam Văn Hiến, Saigon , Vietnam
Death Consciouness
When the big dragonfly was in flight over the May paddock
Its two eyes engaged in hunting a certain smaller dragonfly for food ;
The little kid quit school to stroll along the edge of the paddock ,
Then stopped,
and used a striker with sticky breadfruit resin
to catch the dragonfly turned hunter
But this insect was wiser
than the kid allowed it to be :
it quickly moved elsewhere
The kid did not give in,
he took the small dragonfly as bait
Which enjoyed a measure of freedom
at the end of the string in the hand of the kid
The dragonfly turned hunter
was not good enough to avoid the string
It alighted on the victim,
then lifted it up to its mouth
The kid spun back the string,
took the dragonfly by its tail
He burst out laughing,
“ Here you are, say goodbye to your freedom “ .
I spent the whole morning
to search for the truthful meaning of life
Looking at the germinating seeds washed
in by the rain last night
This morning
I met the kid who quit school for a stroll
The sun was high,
near the red flower thicket
he dug the earth to bury the insect
Its is no longer in life,
its body cuts to bits
Ah!
Returning to dust, it no longer cared
if there was still light in the world
The little kid used to feel sad
when evening came
He was sick with learning,
he scorned to hear the teacher’s words anymore
He now asked me,
“What is the use of all this miserable business ?”
And tell me ,
“.. you are old enough
why do you waste time with a kid’s play
why did you borrow my sling
and you hid behind the gourd plant
throwing little stones at the bees hovering
from flower to flower ?
and tell me ,
you kept the light on all night,
did you study inside the mosquito net ?
you had a funny face when another bee stung you
you little insect
but surely you must be curious
why it stung you go savagely “.
I know the meaning of life already, my boy
It died
and its death taught me courage
Death or life really makes very little difference
The dragonfly hunter had no choice
but to live on a smaller one
It died because of you
and no other fellow insect took
to revenge its death
It was not the same of bees,
it was not the same with ants either
I live by myself
I have no worry
whatsoever because I do not ecpect anything from anyone
We are bees.
We are ants
We are dragonflies
We are full of hatred
and consciouness of death
But let’s face it,
you are not old enough
to grasp why I’ m still nursing my deep wound .
July, 16, 1963.
Life As Ranging Rope
1
Eighteen years of age,
ample breasts ,
nice make up,
wearing jeans,
looking at the rain outside
Night was torn apart by the sad, voice singing
Midnight.
Opening the door,
looking at the rain now falling thicker
Sure as hell,
she could kill men with her charming smile
But the seldom smiled to those around her
Her step-father was not Daddy
and was rather badly treated at that
Her mother brought sorrow to her first children
by marrying a second husband
Her own son, a kid as strong as an athlete
and as manly as an American movie actor
He screamed ,
“You pay for your crime, I tell you “
Night after night you sleep with my mother
When I am a man I will strike you for sure
I’ll put a stop to your dishonoring my family’s name
No, no, no longer a teenager,
she can sing if she likes to,
and she can sleep with anyone she damm pleases
See me, face me, silly old man
You are fifty and you still pratice gym
You like good food, good drink, good clothes
You like fun.
Do you still love life that much ?
You’re no moralist,
o silly old man
You hate me ,
brand me as a hoodlum
because I’m no son of yours .
( Midnight…
I awoke and heard the fitful cries of anguish !)
2
The morning was misty,
the lamp was still burning
A girl’s sigh saddened the heart of any sensible boy
Have a look at her in the mirror :
she was ravishing,
there is no doubt about that
Her lips rouged,
but not to see her brother off for soldiering
Mind you it was not bullets that he would fire,
but its was anger
Mother could not help her tears
Sister looked at him as if he was a lover .
( I woke up in the middle of the night, hearing sobs…”
3
The daughter told everybody the made clothes
She was off very early every morning
and was not back until late night
What the hell did she really do,
nobody had any clue
But who really cared !
Who really cared !
Thanks to her,
her little sisters had candies to eat
Thanks to her,
they had nice clothes to wear
And they had nice words to say about her,
they were very fond of her
We the neighbors believed what we were told.
We were not fussy people.
( At night we heard merry singing and sobbing as well )
4
One morning she was escorted home by two cow cops,
with the handcuffs on her wrists
How pitiful she looked !
She could anly weep to plead for mercy
There was consclusive evidence :
she was caught sleeping naked with a foreigner in a hotel .
Ah, what a shabby singer she was !
By no stretch of the imagination could she be taken as a tailor …
As for me, I believed her self-defence supremely convincing
I judged her and found her innocent
I passed the verdict as a poet,
I got no money at all,
so it was not a professional occupation
I was concerned to see deeply into humain motivation
The fake singer’s mother cried loudest of all.
(That night,
it was surprisingly quiet,
no singing, no sobbing,
nothing…)
5
I could hear the funeral march beating
As coffins passed through the road in front of my house
Day after day without relatives following the coffin
Who had died ?
How did he live ?
Could a life be so short and sad ?
Well,
I knew you were those who had paid the price of patriotism
Seeing the flag-wrapped coffins !
Alas
it broke my heart that those wives forgot you, not long after that
I knew they wanted to ger married again, leaving your children uncared for
I knew why these unfaithful women hated dogs like hell !
Night and day were indistinguishable,
the singers’s voice and weeping already died down
Then one sad evening I raised my voice to sing for myself
Evoking the sad image of two love beings,
her and myself, on the hill of pines
The little girl from the house next door started eating candies bought with cash
Seeing her wearing a morning band I asked her about it
Sadly she told me his brother had been killed in a battle
When I asked about her sister she shook her head :
“No, no, I have no sister,
my sister was not a whore ! “.
Night and day are alike, lfe is but a hanging rope
They are still living, still living…
there is not much sound and fury…
Raise Your Heads
1
When they have much money,
sure you can ask them to buy this or that
Sure,
they are the cream of society
Sure,
their services can never be free
Sure,
their hands are clean thanks to good, expensive soap
Sure,
their teeth are clean and shining
( for the same reason )
Sure,
their voices are resounding because full of pride
They come to you,
do nothing for you
Anyway,
they expect too much from you .
( I tell you, nobody needs to worry about them )
2
Whatever you do which involves no real labor,
no genuine care, no love on your partner
I could’nt have suffered,
but now it is too late for that
They should have earned their life honestly,
but they should have the will
They should have known humility,
so that they are not full of arrogance
Really they have never know real love, so they should not talk of love.
( I tell you, they are downright contemptible ).
3
Today I walk Saigon streets in sunny weather
The air is invigorating,
I am enjoying myself
I feel myself a new man.
Cheer up,
dear follow.
He
to poet-judge Dao Minh Luong,
1
He wrote poems to sing of freedom and to denounce slavery
His wish to be a willow tree on the windy coast
He wrote in poems,
this world is full of great expectations
He and a deep love for less lucky countrymen
His hate :
the trucks of screaming prisoners on the way to court
To make money was the last thing he would think of
He lived a good life,
he was nice to those around him
He even shared the poverty of his fellow mates
He spent many years to pore over books
in the university
His talking straight
and thinking straight endeared him
in the eyes of many
He solemnly swore,
I will never do bad things to others .
He wept over the death of Frederic Garcia Lorca,
the Spanish poet
He pointed to the picture of Franco ( Francisco) ,
loudly condemning him as a cruel man
He paid homage to Vietnamese hero
Nguyễn Thái Học.
( I shared his convictions and held him in admiration !
2
Time passed …
Times was a great master …
time taught us to do good is never easy
Many a night I could not sleep
because of him
Now that he was a judge,
he betrayed his own beliefs
Holding the conscription notice,
he shrugged his head :
“…tell me, what is this all about ? tell me .
I only want to live, I am afraid to die, I love myself
I have only one life and I don’t want to lose it …”
He burst out crying as a little kid .
(On the way home, I could not say a word !)
What I Saw
on the gloomy sky of today?
What did I see,
apart from blood stained rolls of barbed wire
What did I see,
a city besieged
What did I see,
cops outnumbered people in the streets
What did I see,
soldiers were even more numerous than cops :
At the crossroads today and old woman is screaming over the loss of her son
He quit school, smashed everything on his road to the future
He frail body in clothes whiter than whiteness fell on the bitumen road.
Have you died,
my sister aged only eighteen
who has not known love
You have left us,
cowards of thirty years of age
Who will write two words Viet Nam
on the gloomy sky of today ?
I look forward to seeing ,
a horizon bathed in blood :
“Down with tyranny,
down with repression…! “
What did I see,
alas my shortsighted eyes could not see far
What did I see,
they killed people in the roundup last night
What did I see,
my barefooted people with mourning bands
on their loose and dreary hair, bursting into tears
What did I see may newborn children,
refusing to live in this monstrous world !
What did I see,
sisters and mothers awaiting their jailed brothers and sons
The sight of schoolgirls tearing their coats
to make banderoles haunted me
I shouted to exhort others to rebellion !
Love Lifted Me
Trying to hury my lingering sadness in the softness of a woman’ s body
My heart is bloodless so I take a hot bath
Casting a glance at the misty vale,
I dream of European looking women
In my heart of hearts,
what I need is only a soft body
Soldiers in combat garb are moving outside
The people try to find out about this wretched country
through the B.B.C
Lying on the white sheet my eyes stare at the stone walls
I hear nothing,
nothing at all around me
A nurse in white is walking to and fro
Puzzled,
I take her as a wandering ghost
There is simply no end to my misery !
The radio music is torturing me
I scream for help until it is turned off
Now,
I know a woman is what I long for
As sweet human voice,
a happy moment in life .
Dalat, October, 1963.
Our Fatherland Must Go !
Our country is no longer one and the same
( A fish cut in two must be still trembling for a while )
On sunny days there are sidewalk,
vendors trying to sell flags at give away prices
I turn away ,
to avoid the sight of foreigners taking pictures of streets scenes
Men limping,
women welling wares,
children begging
How about my friends,
the bourgeois dressed smartly in European clothes
Nothing is lacking for those who are so gracious and beautiful
But they want to sell out our fatherland mocking at our sorrows
They want to sell out ,
our fatherland along with the flags and you name what
Evrything is for sale,
everything must go
And they fly abroad.
Leaving us behind
And what we can do,
when they are already in the air ?
Oh !
They are never to be trusted,
the “ good friends” of the foreigners .
Not one of them have ever cared for us …
Let the flag vendors do something worthwhile
Let they bring water,
when we walk barefoot the sun is hot
Sure they are reliable,
they will not sell our fatherland
Sure they will not flee ,
our country now in its hour of need and in the future .
Grief has made stone perspire literary
Grief has badly shaken all of us, don’t you see ?
( I start writing about the fate of our land )
Upon the Death of Writer Nhất Linh (*)
When I was under twenty, it was not long ago
Picking a red,
red rose I was praising you as a great writer of us all
Standing by myself amidst the soft,
cool air of a Hanoi
I let my soul fellow the footsteps of our heroes
O how I wished then
to be like DŨNG in “ Two Friends”
When I was twenty ,
I lived in the fashion of your heroes.
Time passed… and yes,
quickly than any of us could imagine !
Your image no longer brightened our souls
Your image is a dim as a still life painting .
Then came one afternoon. Dressed in smart clothes
I took a seat and ordered ,
a morning cup of coffee – at The Pagode’s Café –
Angry with myself turned a bourgeois,
who knew how to spend money
I looked for a daily,
stared dismally into space and indulged in day-dreams
Hearing the sweet sounds of music by those
who crossed the Pacific Ocean years ago
What do Asians think of,
surrounded by waste land ?
Suddenly something struck at my head cool as a needle :
“ Writer Nhất Linh committed suicide,
swallowing poison on the 7th day of the 7th month this year “
Reading his biography on newspapers and periodicals
I had to frown at distortions,
yes,
cruel distortions
Aimed at him and Asian literature as well :
( Sure,
criminal minded persons
could not understand a damn thing about us )
I must put down the cup of coffee,
on table of The Pagode ‘s Café ,
thinking of you ,
who had left this world ,
forever and forever !
I decide,
this volume of poetry,
should contain only UPLIPTING POEMS
and sacred numbers – let us remember well:
“ the 7th day of the 7th month in 1963
The 49th day after his death “
(“He who lies in the grave
has the power on the destiny of the living !” )
(* : Nhất Linh ( real name NGUYỄN TƯỜNG TAM: 1906-1963 Saigon) was a great writer. Apart from his lasting literary fame, the real sign of greatness lies in his suicide in protest against dictator Ngô Đình Diệm ( 1963).
To Be a Girl
Where there are flies there’s God
Where’s God lonely men have a friend
I’ve walked all trails in my country
When I stopped the city of Dalat
Fortunately I had a companion to keep off the ghosts .
Your face is haunting me,
in day and night
Lying in bed,
I keep thinking of you
I simply cannot help it
Your lips are so delicate,
your eyes just don’t go away
On the threshold of adulthood
I’m still looking for a sister soul
I have climbed to the top of Lang Bian Hill
When all I wanted was to bury my head in your floating hair
Is there any love story
which is not beautiful
Is there a blemish pervasive enough
to blot out deep humiliation inside ?
I think continuously
of you and me and all.
To be a girl,
to be a bar hostess
Is to be stripped of the liberty to live straight
And forced to put on airs
for the sake of money
Remembering the sweet moment
worth the money I saved in one year
You held me in your arms
Your warmth was better to me than the heat from the fireplace
I was yours,
all yours,
even it for a brief moment only
We were together twelve long hours .
( Tomorrow I will live a world of memories ).
Epitomizing Day To Day Life
Today the sun shone brightly as on other days
Rain or shine did not matter much,
but the cost of living,
had risen sky high
( The price of the bicycle imported from Europe had been increased by 50 per cent
If the bicycle was sick the owner would pale too )
In my family there were neither women nor small kids
There were just for four of us of various ages
The head of the family of forty six had been a widower for four years
Of his two sons the older son just turned twenty
We had enough food but we were not very happy
The sixteen year old boy started coloring nudes
He was fond of cutting out pictures from movie magazines
and watched female loveliness closely
As for me
I saw life pass calmly
This did not mean I was free from worry
O my twenty year old girl.
I love your simple charms
You do not wear ornaments
( the price of gold had nearly doubled )
But your sweet smile
could make many a heart beat quicker .
At the back of our house there was a thatched house
They needed a dependable sweing machine ,
but they could not afford it
The foreman had lost many a finger
Looking at him,
I suffered as much as he did
Every morning he got up early and hastened to start work
He was a real beast of burden
Beside our dwelling was a house crammed,
with so many beds that there as apparently
no way out .
The soldier’s wives renting the house could do nothing
but sleep
Their husbands at war had not come back
We read in newspapers that thousands of youths had been killed,
their bodies left unburied
A silent sea of faces blurred in tears
Every month one thousand soldiers lost their lives
while the enemy casualties were four times as numerous
Let’s hang these papers as talismans on our beds…
On the farther side of the road
A curious news is being spread – a reliable one, alas !
Concerning a seventy – thousand-piaster worth American motorcycle
A two-cylinder Harley,
which can ride fast on the mute road
And the Vietnamese motorcycle whose price is unknown
A talkative woman-motorcycle ,
who only moves in bed
The two crazy owners exchanged the aforesaid things,
as in a fairy tale
A lover of good living,
the airman preferred the flashing motorcycle to his wife
So he was in treaty with the American sergeant for… her
In working hours,
the American ,
and the woman-motorcycle are free to rock in their bed.
( Meanwhile the Vietnamese husband can ride the Harley on the road)
We rightly guess he would avade any questioning on its price
Such is the story of the woman with two husbands
The story which makes an eighteen-year-old girl
burst out laughing hysterically
Sewer water,
rain,
tear,
tea an semen
(Those kinds of water need being purified to become just clean water )
Epitomizing life I could not help frowning and sighing
The forty six year old woman is still a widow
The twenty six year old chap is still reading death announcements of known persons
The sixty year old boy does not want to be a man yet
The foreman,
after the incident,
is still collecting trophies
The old man of seventy has died,
buried without a proper funeral !
I , over thirty now,
is still without a woman.
The bicycle,
after being repaired ,
is laying still in a corner
And the eighteen year old girl is criticizing my poetry :
“ I don’t known what you mean
I don’t like poetry,
I don’t like you at all
I hate all men who are bachelors
I hate your so called “ UPLIPTING POEMS “.
Trouble of Mind
I’m troubled when you are by my side
It’s a good thing – then I don’t feel any sadness
I feel as young as an eighteen year old boy
When I look at myself in your bright eyes
You’re off today, I am alone in this highland
Everything is mute,
not sound is heard,
my soul is following you
I only hope there will be moments you think of me
I known,
I know,
you’re just a plain girl
But I cannot put you out of my mind
Late noon,
the car moves up the slope
I’m standing here,
feeling the future hold for us
When you’re with me I forget all,
all,
all.
I forget the wretched land which is ours
I forget all,
all,
all ?...
It’s raining
it’s raining hard and strong
I’ m sleeping soundly
O my girl now
that you’re over nineteen .
Dalat , 1963.
In A Time of Disturbance in Saigon
to Lê Thị Kim Dung ,
”…O my girl student I met by chance ...”
1
It was noon.
A big crowd in Saigon looked up
The sun was turning purple
green,
yellow
Buddha was shedding tears
I looked up too
What was is happening
( People sre talking of the age old prophectic of Trạng Trình …)
It was a misty morning in Dalat
The pilgrims
from anywhere
were climbing Lang Bian Heights
A story ws spreading
any disease could be cured
by fire and incense
Standing at the top
I looked at the swarming crowd
True,
our life today was too tiring
Frenzied people would go anywhere for some help
All of us were as the edge of an unfathomable abyss…
O my girl student I met by chance
What do you have if it’s not love my dear
We need many things
a hell of a lot of things
Things will be worse
before they are better
Love id as pressing as freedom from hunger and thirst
Without it my life is a nullity,
a void…
I hope
you’ll share my faith in our land
Our faith in the future of each of us
You’ll be back
you’ll be with me
Love
real love
is what we need
It’s all we ever need
This shabby land
should be destroyed by fire or by water or both
We’ll build the sun anew
Once the river had flown
it will never roll back same again .
Oct.30, 1963 .
Yes, a predestined encounter
I was haunted by you
week after week
Now in hot, sweaty Saigon
my heart is still in cool Dalat
I am thankful for all that
even if I am stripped of possessions
I would give all
for that precious encounter
( When we shared our compassion for our wretched land
It really uplifted )
How I hope to see you again.
2
It was right
Alas,
poor people were making love
even when they had empty bellies
I had been without a woman
for a long,
long time !
So at night I kept thinking of strange words…
An eighteen year old girl
talked of sex
as expertly as a doctor .
( Even when she was only a hairdresser :
“… My being at home
at night
was not necessary
My stepfather
would try to seduce me
he was a horrible man …
I want to follow my love
who has never pressed about marriage
As far as Dalat to pass the night together
We will be warm
we will be cold
and forget
all, all, all…
I want to follow any man
I am thinking of dead young men
who will never come back .
My presence
in the family
at night
is not necessary at all “.
3
My mates
have gone
I am left alone
in this dark, mean place
Where has the red sun gone
I have not seen
the student
again
Now I am worrying
where will my next meal come from
Life is so difficult
a small cup of coffee
has become a luxury
Apart from this,
I cannot believe what I read
what I am told
I’m so miserable
I have no tears left
( The people in the West
are so mature ! )
We are childish
in spite of our long history
We are so weak
we depend on outside aid too much
We are so immature
we dare not have a cool look
at ourselves .
( Anyway
my simple remedy is as follows )
Let us take care of ourselves
we are sick of advice
no counsel
no,
nothing .
Let us refuse any aid as long as we are not equals
(Two lovers who share the same bed
but have different dreams
, would do better to part )
Just let us
live on our own
So that we can be ourselves.
It is noon.
The people of Saigon are looking at the sun
They wait
All of us wait .
Revolution Is a Good Thing !
To blame is surely bad,
to be possessed by greed or lust or anger ..
But I merely want to put down this as a matter of record .
Till yesterday they slept a lot,
drank a lot,
ate a lot,
did an awful a lot of bad things…
One day later…
they are begging for mercy .
Critique of Life ,
A Poet in Society
1
In this century,
the life of a man in a week,
small country
Still leaves much to be desired
(The world broke in two or three long time ago
There is little we can do about it )
For an ordinary man it would take him a long time
Before he can have a cool look at himself and his society
He must have a wife and kids
just to be called a responsible citizen
I live as bravely as a big tree in the forest
Braving rain and thunder and all…
Today
as yesterday
still without a family
I feel pity for all,
for everybody
in this wretched land
This society is full of injustice
It must be destroyed by fire and water .
Only twice
did I weep
In 1945 when the Revolution broke out,
and the day,
I lost my Mother
Dear friends I’live enough
I’ve suffered enough
In this stagnant society am I needed ?
What I can do besides writing poems ?
I give this critique of life out of concern for it
I want to be true to myself
and to others …
Why are there more prisons than schools
more cops than people out in streets .
( These poems
have just been unearthed
To be pit under the glittering sun )
Well, in this society
monks and spies look the same
Poets only produce what had been ordered
The sky today is cloudless
I feel like crying now
But isn’t it much better
to suffer silently .
2
I grew up with the mist in the highland
In my home place the straight
standing trees outnumbered spikes
My first love left me
when the Revolution broke out
O mountains ad forests
I’m still alone
Is my mind being taken away from me
I have been over the abyss before
My days
have been full of sweat and tears
The thousand love poems
I’ve written
are not love poems
I’ve learned sorrow
since I first went to the graveyard
Just to pluck a flower
on an unknown tomb
My parents left me
a long time ago
Far from me,
with no one to weep for them
In my childhood house
on that highland
I’ve only the sun as friend
(Apart from passing girls
as silent as shadows )
I’ve grown up
with love since that time
Now that I’m a man
I’m not too concerned with it
Love pure,
noble love
does not mean a thing for me
Past memories
make me truly sad
But I’ve become so mature
and so much wiser
I’ve realized my lot
of being in this land
Let me be without memory .
This century
rugged land far exceeds fertile part
I grew up in difficult times
I refuse to hear soothing words
Life is sripped of liberty
Every line of poetry should be a bullet
To bring down walls of calumny and hyprocrisy
Look !
Even the grass we grow in public gardens is imported from Europe
I feel estranged in my country
and turn a foreign visitor
Let me be evade a heroic mockingbird flitting in the setting sun
Let me evade the world I never made
When I cast a glance at the desolate expanse …
The best way to travel is to walk by oneself …
I choose Autumn,
pire forest and sad shunshine ;
I give up writing poetry
and will not torture myself anymore
Do me a favour,
my solemn-faced and wise wife
Say to me,
“ Burn a fire ! Hang the mosquito-net ! “
“ Burn a fire ! Hang the mosquito-net ! “
I am the voluntary slave,
who is fully contented
Let us have a long sleep
O wife, sons and daughters !
Tomorrow morning
we’ll wake up early
set out to grow vegatables .
Outside the hedge near the farm gate
We’ll put up a board,
“ Trespaasers Will Be Prosecuted !”
In all languages of the world .
Postcript
These UPLIPTING POEMS – with the exception of two – were written during the stormy days before the oppressive regime of President Ngô Đình Diệm was brought down in late 1963.
A full decade has passed. I sadly realize how I have changed but Vietnam itself is little change since that that and it is still the Waste Land
Now we must go through darkness again before a New Day is born.
We publish this collection of poems with the hope that our country will soon change for the better. All of us should be better.
And I will write “ happier” poems !
September 7, 1974.
THEPHONG.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Thephong *
translated from theVietnamese
by Dam Xuan Can
From a Writer’s Diary
I started writing in 1952 in Hanoi
At the beginning of 1953 when I ceased to receive any money from my mother, I was obliged to embark on journalism of the humblest sort. I was charged with the collecting news tips around the four districts of Hanoi
I came to South Vietnam before Điện Biên Phủ and the subsequent Geneva
In those days, there were very few Northerners and life was pretty hard for me. The highest price I enjoyed for a review was one hundred and fifty piasters. At the time, I had in store some memorial novels dealing with life of the montagnards in my homeland in the northernmost part of Vietnam Hanoi , Đợi Ngày Chiến Thắng ( Waiting for Day of Victory ), and Cô Gái Nghĩa Lộ ( A girl from Nghia Lô ), written in Saigon . The royalties for each of this trio were thousand piasters for the first edition of two thousand copies. It was really great for an apprentice writer like me. The public received my novels with much enthusiasm.
* A selection of Thephong’s poetry appeared in the April 1968 issue of TENGGARA.
The charge that I held many a critic in slight contempt was partly justified . The so-called critics could not fail to acclaim any book by any influential man. Take this case. When a book by Phan Văn Tạo was released, lots of provincial cadres offered to sell it and some tens of newspapers were quick to comment on it favourably. Even a minister in Bảo Đại’s era wrote a partisan review in his extremely polished style in le Journal d’ Extrême Orient the prominent French language daily in Saigon. I knew and I still believe he did not write it out of sincere admiration. When Phan Văn Tạo presented his book to Nguyễn Đức Quỳnh, then adviser to the Minister, the latter said, “ You’re only a writer with half of your being because you’re only acquainted with the pink side of things.”
To quote Jan Kott,
Uniformity of opinion among intellectuals is always a bad thing. The more complete it is, the worse the omen is. Uniformity of poorly informed opinions are all the more. We deplore conformity. It’s like witnessing a farce to hear a Minister of Cultural Affairs making a plea to wtiters to work harder while he did not believe in literature .
Although the situation then was not so bad as in Poland
What worries me is not the fact that many Polish stories are badly written, but the fact that many Polish writers are standing around and tellinglies. As a critic I feel it is my duty to scrutinize the artist’s motivation, that is, real behaviour or his attitude towards life. I cannot praise a book it if does not reflect some concern about life. I felt nauseous when literary awards were decided by government officials who had very little knowlelge, if any, of literature.
Can government officials become great writers ? Perhaps, but only something like one out of a million. The majority of them only uphold the order of the Town Hall clock.
I was never keen on behaving myself and writing as if I had my head in the clouds. Only those to whom luxury and misery make no difference and who do not compromise with their conscience can understand me. For this I wrote these words by Essenin in capitals:
DRINK WITH ME, O SUFFERING FEMALE DOG ! DO COME AND DRINK WITH ME !
In alien Paris, after losing his money Mayakovsky asked for help from friends and had to swear, shrugging his shoulders, “ How could these lousy bastards dare to think of generosity ?”
Those who insist on having a tasty breakfast with a gulp of delicious coffee, those who
enjoy the wishful thinking of having contributed to national culture after attending functions held in luxurious hotels had better not read my books if they wish to avoid disappointment. My sort of rugged literature is definitely not to your taste. Don’t torture me any more. Stop giving me the fly-caused itchy sensation to a pussy wound. You can go and pick up pretty girls, suits expertly tailored in cities as far as Paris
* * *
In the last ten years how did I live ? Time and again I faced hunger, humiliations of all sorts and committed such unsavoury acts as theft and extortion of money from friends. All sorts of queer things. All my enemies can use these to discredit me if thwey want to ; there is no need for them to forge any other accusations. Or, they can just quote from my published autobiography Nửa Đường Đi Xuống ( Midway in my Life’s Journey), wherein the author is never evasive about any issue, however touchy it is. I have never practiced blackmail and I am living victim of blackmail; I have never been a vandal and I am branded a literary vandalist unhonourably. I am just an agnotic – never an atheist. I am condemned of being a Judas, the traitor who sold out Jesus Christ. An innocent, I was reported to be chief of the destructive committee. All this happened to the simple writer that I was when the tempo of our literary activities was at an all time low.
In France Independence
In my ten years of writing, there are at least three memorable events concerning three of my readers and myself. I am going to relate them one by one. I did not know the first reader, a Quang Trung Training Center Central Vietnam who met me in the street. He stopped to say” Hello there “ and then continued, “ I know you because I’ve read your book Nửa Đường Đi Xuống which my brother bought. I can recognize you from your photo on the jacket “.
Hesistingly, he asked me whether I had lunch. It was around three in the afternoon then. I was deeply moved, knowing my account of hunger in the autobiography was very convincing. I have not seen him since and do not even recall his name. But I would still recognize him if I saw him again and I remember the address he gave me, 66 Phó Đức Chính St. I did not go there. The third event occurred during a visit I paid in 1963 to Tùng Nghĩa ( Dalat ), the settlement area reserved for the Thais of Lai Chau, Son La and Nghĩa Lộ. I had brought a camera with the intention of taking snapshots of the sweet Thai girls – the beautiful flowers of my hometown Nghĩa Lộ . I was a bit disappointed because I did not see any girl in the tradiotanl dress. When my friend and I stopped in front of a house next to a well I struck up a conversation with a Thai woman. When her daughter of about seventeen or eighteen overheard me speaking in Thai she came out to join us although she was ill at the time. I asked her in Vietnamese whether she was Thai. She nodded and very graciously she invited us in. We sat around a table made of rough unplanned wood. She asked us where we came from and what we were doing. Before I could reply my friend hastily declared I was a writer. She put out her tongue and frankly confessed she was very much afraid of journalists. Then she asked me about my job. She let me know that she read a “ forest” story about highland and had enjoyed it very much. I enquired about the title of the book and the name of the author. I also asked her if she had kept it. She went in and brought it out. The cover of the book was torn and covered with signatures of all sizes and descriptions and in all sorts of ink. The student accompanying me was very young and did not know much about me except that I was a writer. Looking at the jacket, he said in surprise, “ Here he is, the author of this book.”
I was deeply touched that my book was appreciated by a girl in this isolated place – a girl from my hometown. I told her I wrote it a long time ago She praised and criticized me at the same time. According to her, the description of life in highland was accurate; but I had made a mistake in using the word koóng khảu for kóm khảu . I learned that her name is Lò Lệ Thu or La Lệ Thu if it is Vietnamised. But I prefer the first. Later I wrote a dedication to her at the beginning of my book of poetry Trước Mắt Nhìn Thi Sĩ ( Under the Poet’s Eyes ) written in Dalat in this period. Those who cared for me most were poor people .
Let’s stop wandering about the innumerable manifestaions of hypocrisy in a society like Vietnam Vietnam
When I come to these lines it is eleven in the morning. People are battling which other right next to my boarding house. The cause of it all ? The rubbish from foreign-operated trucks stationed near the rubber plantation. They hope and so do I . But my hope is only that I would be able to write a story about their hard life , their relentless struggle for life in this hard-core prostitute-infested area. After probing deeper into their motives. I no longer feel nauseous. They are just human beings. Let us struggle for life, no matter how much sweat we will have to shed. I wrote them in Khu Rác Ngoại Thành ( The Rubbish Tip Outside the City , )*
How to sum up my experience in ten years of writing ? What makes me so bitter was just the sheer lack of courage on the part of the so-called intellectuals, writers, artists, engineers of the masses’ soul – in short the backbone of any viable society – those who were ready to do anything, no matter how dregading it was, to achieve a sort of petty satisfaction. They knew this damn well. What makes me still hate them like hell is simply their hypocritical preaching about humanity’s love and so on. And I wrote,
Be assured, intellectual worms who cling to the vegetable tops
When you die, you’ll occupy three-meter-long tombs
And these bitter lines o poetry :
Suddenly I was dumb-struck by the fact my country
was in full plight
I live in Saigon the year round without a warm coat
Witnessing my people searching for food
around the foreigner-operated rubbish dump
I am standing pensively at the Bẩy Hiền crossraods
Watching kids growing on bread scattered on the earth
And the older boy presenting his brother with a
piece of chocolate picked up from the roadside
I cannot contain my anger …
Why on earth did they dare consider art as mere ornament
The white-collared students by day turned artists by night
------------------
- Thephong, Khu Rác Ngoại Thành / The Rubbish Tip Outside City ( bilingual), Dai Nam Van Hien Books, Saigon,
South Vietnam - The visiting-card supported poets are so numerous
the printers cannot promptly carry out the orders
All of them are using literature the same way as bar hostesses
Look ! The millionaire’s poet son is expressing his pity for beggars
The ex-sub prefecture chief is expounding a new way of life
Can we believe in the love for humanity expressed in his book
With a fervid tone which can be matched by a judge’s voice
While he keeps giving his dog a daily ration better than a Viet’s.
When I visited Thai settlers in Tùng Nghĩa ( Dalat)
I was struck by this scene :
Thai kids have water in their mouths, craving for sticky rice
And they cry because this Têt they won’t have firecrackesr.
When their parents share their sadness, who is in a position
to tell them to be cheerful
Thinking of what the future holds for them, I give this conclusion :
… And this society, this life, this sun is still as dark as night itself….
I believe my same statements scattered here nad there will shed
light on reality, and consequently will help politicians to do
something about this shocking state of affairs.
O the people who have lived through so many years of ordeal due
to the communists and colonialists and the Fanoti rulers :
The million square meters of cultivated land
belong to my countrymen
The million lines of poetry which can become
directives for this nation in the future
Should be preceded by the million lines of poetry
cataloguing the hardships of today…
( Trước Mắt Nhìn Thi Sĩ
Under the Poet’s eyes )
After a full breakfast consisting of steak and casse-croute a friend of mine, aged 50. gave me this” advice” reassuringly:” Go one like this for sometime, man. After you get married it won’t be long before you understand us better and then it’s entirely up to you to hate or pity us.” I was really upset, although for a very brief moment only.
A lot of indecent intellectuals who used to be very keen on doing good to the public in pre-war times tried by any means to achieve wealth in the post-war period. And their famous excuse was that they did such and such a thing because of wives and kids. What a shame for them. And what a pity for the women who are their wives and the boys who are their children ! Unsuccessful writers have the potential to become efficient censors or alert informers .
I think I will get married. This year I am thirty-two. According to Shin Nai Am who wrote that masterpiece of Chinese fiction, All Men Are Brothers . I should not get married at this late age. But if I do, I will strive to feed my wife and children by the sweat of my brow. I am no different from you, nor do I want to be because I still cannot afford anyother thing than red rice, dried fish, chilly and pepper. But I ‘m a bit different from you because I have the guts to say that I have been a bloody liar or I have robbed a neddy friend. I am not a coward and I know what I am doing for my country’s literature. And this is the reason, I could not help writing this short account of my life as a writer. I am not simply a man beset by narcissim.
In 1959 writer Thiên Giang wrote an open letter to Nguiễn Ngu Í discussing my case. Mr. Í has shown me the letter. He also expressed his desire to see me in his residence at Xóm Chuồng Ngựa, Gia Định Province
( p. 52 to 57).
(TENGGARA, Oct.1968,
Volume 2. No 2.
Thephong
Real name : ĐỖ MẠNH TƯỜNG
Pen name : THẾPHONG
Date and place of birth: Yên Bai Province , North Vietnam
Religion : Christian
Family status: Married, five children.
Education ; Graduated from Highschool Hanoi in 1954.
Present position: Airman, Vietnamse Air Force, since August 1967;
Founder of Đai Nam
Vietnmaese and English.
Novelist , poet.
Former positions: School teacher, Contributor Văn Hóa Á Châu ( Asian Culture
Review ), Sinh Lực ( Creative Fffort ), Đời ( Life) etc…
Political activities: None.
Publications: Poems:
- If You Were My Life ( Nếu anh có em là vợ)
- Mai A Crown ( Vương miện Mai A)
- Of Women and Fatherland ( Đàn và và Tổ Quốc)
- Myself for Hire (Cho thuê bản thân )
- Under the poet’s eyes ( Trước mắt nhìn thi sĩ )
- Vietnam
- South Vietnam ,the baby in the arms of the American nurse * ( Nam
Việt nam, đứa trẻ thơ của vú em Huê Kỳ )
- Dissimilarity ( Sai biệt )
-Uplifting Poems * ( Thơ làm lớn dậy con ng
Novels and Short stories :
-Nửa Đường Đi Xuống ( Midway in My Life Journey )
- Người thương binh Liên khu…( The Wounder Soldier )
-Người lính Casablanca ( The Soldier from Casablanca
-Thủy và T6 ( Thủy and T6 )
- Truyện người của tình phụ ( The Adulteress)
-Tuyển truyện Thế Phong ( Thephong ; A Selection from his Writing ).
- Tình sơ n nữ ( A Highland Lass’s Lover )
-Đợi ngày chiến thắng ( Waiting for Day of Victory )
-Người đàn bà không tóc ( The Bald Woman )
-Tôi đi dân vệ Mỹ ( The Ordeal of the American Militiaman * )
-Khu rác ngoại thành ( The Rubbish Tip Outside the City * )
- Thế Phong ,Nhà văn, Tác Phẩm, Cuộc Đời ( Thephong by Thephong;:
The Writer, The Work & The Life * )
-Cô gái Nghĩa Lộ ( The Girl from Nghĩa Lộ )
v.v… etc…
Criticism :
Hàn Mặc Tử & Quách Thoại, nhà thơ siêu thoát ( Two Great Poets of
-Friedrich Nietzsche & Chủ nghĩa đi lên con người ( Friedrich
Nietzsche )
-Nhận diện vóc dáng nhà văn Nguyễn Đức Quỳnh ( Reappraisal
of writer Nguyễn Đức Quỳnh )
-Thức giấc trong văn chương hiện đại Ba Lan ( Awakening in
Present Day of Polish Literarure )
-Giới thiệu nhà văn Constant Virgil Gheorghiu ( Introduction
on writer Constant Virgil Gheorghiu )
-Jacques Perry & Thế nào là Phi lý ? ( Introduction on writer
Jacques Perry )
-Lược sử văn nghệ Việtnam 1900-1956 gồm 4 tập : 1) Nhà văn
tiền chiến 1930-1945, 2)- a) Nhà văn kháng chiến chủ lực
1945-1950, -b) Nhà văn miền Nam
hậu chiến 1950-1956,4) Tổng luận 60 năm văn nghệ Việt
nam 1900-1956 ( A Short History of Modern Vietnamese
Literarure- including 4 tomes : 1) Prewar Writers ( from 1930
-1945) , 2) –a ) Writers in the Resistance Area ( from 1945-1950)
b) Writer of the South ( from 1945-1950 ) , 3 ) Postwar Writers
( from 1950- 1956), 4) A Brief Glimpse at the Vietnamese Literary
Scene , 1900-1956 * )
vv.., e
Translations:
- Mayakovsky, Thi sĩ Nga ( Mayakovsky, Poète Russe by Elsa Triolet, translated from French into Vietnamese).
-Hồi ký ngoài văn chương ( Autobiography précoce by Yevgeny Yevtus-
henko ( translated from French into Vietnamese )
.- Khúc bi ca nàng tiên nhỏ ( La petite fée et le jeune pâtre by Maxim Gorky,
translated from French into Vietnamese .)
- Việtnam bi thảm Đông Dương ( Vietnam
Louis Roubaud, translated from French into Vietnmaese )
- Tuyển thơ Kháng chiến Pháp : 1939-1945 ( La patrie se fait tous les jours
by Jean Paulhan & Dominique Aury , translated from French into Vietnamese )
- Chiếc Roi Ngựa ( La Cravache by Constant Virgil Gheorghiu, translated
from French into Vietnmaese ).
Many words were reprinted in TENGGARA, a review of the Dept. of
English, University of Malaya , Kuala Lumpur ( Malaysia
Diplomatique ( Paris ). And We promise one another * , an anthology
edited by Don Luce and others. ( Washington D.C., U.S.A. 1974).
Special Remaks :
1- Thephong has been widely known in Englsih speaking countries. He has
been invited to The International Writing Program by The Iowa School
* Books are available in English
It is a shame a writer who has a lot to contribute to international forum have been so discouraged. Anyway, his writing are becoming more and more popular among serious readers of Vietnamese literature. Sure he is not the most prolific writer, but he has written nothing which could be rated as a littele significance .
2.-“ Thephong was born in 1932 at Yen Bai Province (North Vietnam ) , and spent his childhood in the northernmost part of Vietnam Vietnam the sky under fire and flames , published in Saigon , May 1967. The collection was obtained for TENGGARA by the young writer, Bur Rasuanto, who was on a visit there recently …
Đam Xuân Cận, in presenting his English translation of Thephong’s poems in Vietnam
( TENGGARA, Volume II, No 1, 1968).
(from WHO’S WHO IN VIETNAM - Vietnam Press, Saigon South Vietnam
50 TÁC PHẨM THẾPHONG
đăng ký tại Cục Bản quyền Tác giả.
-------------------------------------------
Tác phẩm Thếphong ( còn ký Đường Bá Bổn và Đinh Bạch Dân) xuất bản từ 1954 đến nay; nhiều nhà xuất bản tái bản không xin phép.
Đã đăng ký bản quyền tác giả tại Cục bản quyền Tác giả VH-NT/
Bộ Văn hóa Thông tin /Nước Cộng
Hòa Xã Hội Chủ Nghĩa Việt Nam
Giấy chứng nhận số : 341 / VH-BQ-ĐD cấp tại HàNội ngày 15. 8. 1996.
Cấm dịch, in lại, sao chụp, phóng tác, trích đăng từng phần, khi chưa được phép qua tác giả , đại diện cho phép bằng văn bản.
Liên hệ , giao dịch với bà: Nguyễn Thị Khê ,ngụ tại : 25/ 39 A Trần Khát Chân,P. Tân Định, Quận I,
tp. Hồ Chí Minh .
Điện thoại : ( 84.8) 384.360 34.
Email: thephongthephong@hotmail.com
Copyright 1996 by Đỗ Mạnh Tường
All rights reserved in whole or partial reproduction and adaption,transmitted in any form, or by any means, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the author.
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