poems from an asia war: two worlds of luu trong lu by don luce+ j.schafer + j. chagnon/ (usa 1971)
we promise one another - poems from an asia war -
selected and published by don luce, j.c. schafer
+ jacquelyn chagnon- washington d.c. 1971
two worlds of luu trong lu
don luce + j. c.schafer+ j. chagnon
It is hard to imagine Vietnam at peace. Before the war ! Which war? There have been so many. " I was born in war, my father was killed by the war, and I was problably die a violent death because the war, " a seventy six year old student states matter-of-factly The modern song- writer Trịnh công Sơn, tells the history of imperalism against Việtnam in the melancholy verses of "The heritage of Our Mother Land":
A thousand years slaves of the Chinese,
A hundred dominated by the French,
Twenty years of civil war,
The heritage of our Mother Land,
To leave for her children,
The heritage of your Mother Land,
The sad country of Việtnam.
But there were interludes of peace -- short , quiet seasons when laughter seigned over the land. The cycle of life was determined by the rice crop -- and planting time and harvest were days of celebration and song. Such an era is now recalled only by the village elders who reminisce about a time when the seasons came and went quietly, pounctuated by marriages and unhappy love affairs rather than by spring and winter offensives; a time when it was quiet enough, if one listened to hear the rustle of the leaves and a flute sounding softly in the distance a very different world indeed from that of modern Việtnam, the South at least, with its "sunset strip" bars that crowd around the American installations, blaring out and rock-and-roll songs, and with helicopters droning and jets roaring in the sky above.
One such time is called Tiền Chiến Period, the period before the French Indochina War when Vietnamese lived under the French but knew a kind of peace. The first three of the following poems by Lưu trọng Lư bring back some of the beauty and peace of those days. His pre-war poems, particularly "The Sound of Aurumn" are still very popular. They speak not of war, but of the age old struggles -- with the seasons, with love, with autumn sadness. They are proof that the Vietnamese know in peace too there is heartache. It is just that of luxury as sweet as its joys, for the larger tragedy of the war has deprived them of both for so long.
Some of Lưu trọng Lư' s recent poems also give impression to the timeless aspects of the Vietnamese experience. In the following stanza from a poem written in 1965, an old man continues to plow this land in the midst of destruction:
Beside the bomb crater, still smoking
An old uncle already eighty
Plows agile as a youth.
The aged back presses deep to the heart of the earth,
Silver hair like Diên Hồng flies be fore the wind!
Lưu trọng Lư was born in 1912 and went to school in Huế, in what is now South Việtnam, but he along with many other famous poets of the pre-war period now livws in the North. He writes of different kinds of struggles and many of his recent poems like "Women of the South," have dared to challenge the military might of the U.S. and have succeeded in shaking "the brass and steel of the White House."
THE SOUND OF THE AUTUMN
You don't listen to atumn
Under the dim and restless moon.
You aren t' concerned with
Images of absent warriors
In the hearts of lonely women.
You don't listen to the autumn forest,
The quiet rustle of the leaves
Where a bewildered golden deer
Steps on golden leaves.
-- 1939
WHITE CLOUDS
The white clouds fly over
An opening in the bamboo
An the autumn wind comes
And the old sadness, too.
And there are a few young men,
Who know sadness deep and blue
But in whose hearts bloom still
Dreams red of the brightest hue,
-- 1939
WHEN AUTUMN ENDS
Do you ever speak to me
Words full of the love
We knew when we were young?
Do you ever speak to me
When autumn leaves fall
And lie in the empty yard,
And the song of the flute,
From behind some distant curtain.
Softly sounds in the still air?
Do you ever think of me
When you hand reaches out
And pulls a drooping leaf
Down from its branch?
Do you ever think of me
As the birds laugh and the wind jokes
And no one knows the love
I hold for you in my heart.
In a heart which is cold
Like the water of an autumn fake,
As the twilight falls
On a desolate night
I, I hope the days and months
Will not pass too quickly,
But you, you don' t care at all
How the present time passes
And soon winter comes
To the cold river bank,
And hurriedly you marry,
But, tell me, sometimes do you
Still remember the vivid summer,
And my love lingering
In a corner of my heart.
-- 1939.
WOMEN BY THE SOUTH
TRẦN THỊ LÝ *
Long hair, hair of a young mother
Washed in the water of Thu Bồn
Adorning your body, wounded in the hundred places.
In life and, laways loyal death.
MƯỜI ĐỒNG THÁP
Just turned twenty
Leader f three hundred struggles
One leg left, you stand erect,
A beautiful flag wrapping yor body!
NGUYỄN THỊ ÚT
A guerrilla of the Delta
Carrying you only child on your hip,
Combing the river bank
Strikingthe ennemy as naturally as you go to market !
TẠ THỊ KIỀU
With a beautiful name from ancient times,
You're a faithful piece of uncle Hồ.
Striking the enemy, you' re a tiger
Speaking of it, you smile like a flower.
NGUYỄN THỊ ĐỊNH
In the assault you commend a hundred squads
Night returns, you sit mending fighters' clothes
Woman general of the South, descendent from Trắc and Nhị **
You've shaken the brass anD steel of the White House.
--1966
lưu trọng lư
-----
* Trần thị Lý is a woman's name as are the other headings of this poem.
** Trưng Trắc and Trưng Nhị, the famous Trưng sisters who led Vietnamese
against the Chinese about 40 B.C.
< We promise one another/ poems from an Asia war - p. 15-19)
calling the wandering souls by nguyễn du/ translated by lê hiếu (hanoi)
we promise one another - poems from an asia war
selected, published by don luce + j.c. schafer + j.chagnon
-Washington D.C., 1971
calling the wandering souls
by nguyễn du
TRANSLATED FROM THE VIETNAMESE INTO ENGLISH BY LÊ HIẾU *
American military and political leaders could also have profited from reading Nguyễn Du's " Calling the Wandering Souls." It would have helped them to realize the intense alienation to realize the intense alienation that refugee programs cause. No people like to be moved from their homes, but for Vietnamese it is especially painful, for their leave their homes means also to leave the graves of one's ancestors. Vietnamese believes that it is important to be close to the graves of their ancestors, so they can tend to them and offer pryres that their dead ralatives may rest in peace. People who die before they have a family and have no one to look after them in death, nad have no fixed grave are objects of great pity. These are the unfortunate "wandering souls" that Nguyễn Du calls to in his poem. In Vietnam where so many people die young with no families of their own, where one third of the population had been moved at least once, nd where so many families have been split up, there are many wandering souls, and the Vietnamese worry about them and pray for them as Nguyễn Du did so many years ago. DON LUCE
-----
* "Calling the Wandring Souls " was taken from 'NGUYỄN DU AND KIỀU. '
(Vietnamese Studies No. 4, Hanoi, 1965. Translated by Lê Hiếu.)
(DON LUCE' NOTE)
In this seventh month the rain is endless,
The cold penetrates into the dry bones,
The autumn evening is mournful and sad,
The reeds are livid, the leaves of plane trees withered,
In the twilight the birch trees are drooping,
The pear trees shrouded in mist,
Whoever can remain unmoved?
If the world of the living is so sad,
Much sadder must be the world of the dead.
In the utter darkness of the eternal night,
Appear, lost souls, like will-o'-wisps, reveal our presence !
O poor beings, creatures of the ten categories,
Your abandoned souls are roaming in strange lands!
No incense is burning for you.
There were those who pursued riches
Who lost appetite and sleep,
With no children or relations to inherit their fortunes,
With no one to hear their last words.
Riches dissipate like passing clouds,
Living they had their hands full of gold,
Departing from this world, they could take with them no single coin.
At their funeral, hired mourners feigned sorrow,
The cheap coffins were hastily taken away in the night.
Lost souls, they roam the flooded fields
Without any offering of incense or water.
There were those who sought academic honours leading to high places,
To the cities they went, forsaking their native land.
But do arts and letters always bring success?
One day they lay sick in a roadside inn,
Without the love and care of their families.
Dead, they were hastily burried,
Far from the near ones and the ancestral land.
In an abadoned burrying ground they lie,
Their lonely souls wander,
Without being honoured by any offerings.
There were those who sailed on rivers and oceans,
To remote places, blown by the East wind.
A storm midway sent their ships to the botton
And they disappeared into the sharks' bellies.
There were those who engaged in trade,
Their shoulders aching under the load of merchandise.
They died if exposure, far from home,
Their souls now wander along the road.
There were those who, conscripted,
Left their families for the service of the king.
Taken to distant lands,
They lived a life of privations and sufferings.
In war-time human lives are so cheap,
With sword nad fire sowing death
Their roaming will-of-the- wips, apparitions of their lost souls,
Make the scene still more mournful.
There were those who spoiled their lines,
Selling their charms and smiles.
Abandoned by all when youth was gone,
They had no husbands or children to support them.
In their life nothing but humiliation and sufferings,
After their death, only sufferings from kind strangers.
Pitiable was the fate of these women,
Such was their destiny, no ones knows the reason.
There were those who spent their lives begging,
Sleeping under bridges, on the ground.
Yet, like others, they were human beings,
They lived on charity and now lie in roadside graves.
There were those victims of injustice,
Year after year they languished in jail.
Dead, they were buried somewhere near the prison wall.
For their shroud, only a tattered rush mat,.
Will their innocence ever be revealed?
There were the babies born in the unsuspicious hour
Who lived only a few moments.
There' s nobody now to carry them in her arms,
And heart-rending are their feeble cries.
There were those whose live were cut short
By drowning, failing from trees or into wells,
Those who were washed away by strong currents,
Who perished in fires,
Who were devoured by wolves or crushed by elephants.
There were those who gave birth to still born babies.
Who died from miscarriage, or from severe wounds.
Struck by fate midway on the path of life,
They followed each other to the other world,
Each with a different destiny,
Where are they now, those lost souls?
Somewhere they are hiding, maybe among the trees,
Maybe along the streams or among the clouds,
Maybe in the grass or in the bushes,
Or they are wandering aimlessly
By the roadside inns or inder bridges,
Or they seek shelter in temples and pagodes
Maybe they are haunting markets or riverbanks
Or the barren lands, the knolls or the bamboo groves
Misery was their lot in lifetime,
In the cold their corpses are now withering
Year after year exposed to wind and rain,
On the cold ground they lie, sighing.
At dawn, when the cock crows they flee,
Only to grope their way again when night comes.
TRANSLATED INTO ENGLISH BY LÊ HIẾU
(WE PROMISE ONE ANOTHER - POEMS FROM AN ASIA WAR- p.10- 14)
'hết"gay' rồi, ôi hoàng vũ đông sơn !/ thơ nguyễn khôi (hànội)
<Blog của Nhã My>
hết'gay' rồi!
ôi hoàng vũ đông sơn !!!
thơ nguyễn khôi [Hà nội]
(GỬI: THẾ PHONG)
Hoàng vũ Đông Sơn ( đầu tiên, từ trái qua )
cùng một số bạn văn
dự lễ cầu siêu thân mẫu văn sĩ Văn Quang-Nguyễn quang Tuyến.
( ảnh chụp tại tp. HCM)
Trai Đông triều phiêu diêu vào Nam bộ
chân 'hạ sĩ quan' chẳng vào diện H.O.?
đành phải sống vật vờ ăn 'lương vợ'
cũng viết Văn và cũng làm Thơ
Cư xá Thanh đa tồi tàn, xập xệ
xập xệ như 'Đời' chẳng thể'Bay'đi
thôi thì làm Thơ, thôi thì viết Truyện
'Tháng 2 buồn, nhớ Lỗ Tấn' thẫn thờ'*
Có Thế Phong, Văn Quang chia sẻ
Thờ là Thơ để giải nỗi lòng
Văn là Văn 'buồn đời' dâu bể
Còn có gì hy vọng để mà mong ?!
Thôi,Hoàng Vũ Đông Sơn về trời thanh thản
'Bay' thoát đi cái thế giới nhọc nhằn
Thơ,chẳng còn'ruồi,nhặng vo ve quấy đảo'**
hết'gay'** rồi,
ôi Hoàng Vũ Đông Sơn !
---
* tác phẩm của HVĐSơn, Văn Uyển xb, San Jose 2003
** chữ nghiêng: thơ Hòang Vũ Đông Sơn.
HÀNỘI 10-10-2014
nguyễn khôi
(Blog của Nhã My)
kennedy + asian morning western music: poems by the phong - TENGGARA
TENGGARA Vol. 2. No 1- 1968
Dept. of English/ Univ. of Malaya
Kuala Lumpur.
kennedy + asian morning western music
poems by the phong
TRANSLATED BY DAM XUAN CAN
The Phong [1923- ]
THE POEMS reprinted here are taken from a mimeographed collection of poetry by the Vietnamese The Phong, entiled Vietnam : the sky under the flames, published in Saigon in May 1967. The colle tion was obtained for TENGGARA by the young writer Bur Rasuanto, who was on a visit there recently.
The Phong was born in 1932 at Nghie Lo, Yen Bai, and spent his childhood in the nothernmo part of Vietnam. He took part in the resistance at an early age and has been a farmer, soldier, school teacher and editor, besides writing stories, poems and critiques. Dam Xuan Can in presenting his English translation of The Phong's poems in Vietnam: the sky under firea and flames, wrote, " The Phong's poems are particularly difficult to translate,ans I have no illusions whatever about my commandof English. I trust that one day a poet of talent will revise this version and do more justice to the original Readers are bound to feel that Dam Xuan Can do not himself justice. TENGGARA
Kennedy
In a whole morning
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 very sadness
refuses to go
I wonder whether there is any meaning of life
in the wood Our Lady with imnumerable pebbes
in this place I find no solace at all
the see 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
will 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 realise
Christmas is coming soon
in this 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
women 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 war we all haves 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 bathroom
without a dress on
a wife turns away, looks at the husband and waits for him to react
head bowed
he goes on sipping his soft drink
aware that the blue-eyed soldier
thinks all Vietnamese women are keen on seeing naked bodies
in fact his beastly attitude should only shame
compatriots of hero Abraham Lincoln
whose statue was carved on a great mountain
as for me I remember the photo of 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 obscure jingle fall o petty things
only make prostitutes laugh
professionally
I will never forget the morning
I came to the cage-like shop
surrounded by wires for fear of terroist activities
there were four at a table
three Americans and a Viet woman
they seemed to be gallant like Europeans
I sincerely thought so
until the little waiter brought as 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 wen 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 breakfasted 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 Vietnamese woman, the prostitute turned temporary
and profitable wife
has no money nad has begged for a breakfast in vain.
The memory of the G.I. opening the door
of the bathroom to let women appraise his body aches me
for him Americanism simply means this miserable husband
with gold-rimmed spectacles who
walks in the direction of the G.I.
and speaks so softly as if saying prayers
I at first take him to be a pimp
but after the quarrel breaks out
I understand the weeping womenis his legitimate wife
one afternoon
she left Saigon for the fresh see 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 grevious wrong
he walks in
the red cap on his head
losing his arrogance he says softly
"I'm sorry
I'm really very sorry
please accept my apologies..."
then a firm handshake with the husband
as an acknowledgement of friendship
like the handshake insignia printed on aid bags
"I'm sorry for thinking all Vietnamese are prostitutes
and dollars could buy everything"
Still another story
every time the interpreter goes on leave
he see on the highway
a love- starved G.I. simply brandishes his dolla coin
to find the woman he could go ahead with
in my war-town 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 have I found the image of any man more shining than 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 Kennedy Square in Saigon
the man whose wife was mistaken as a prostitute by a man
of Kennedy's nationality
cannot fight back his bitter tears
Christmas night
stars are shinning brightly
on the Saigon Basilica
everything is shrouded in the fog of shame
war
and
war ...
cap Saint Jacques
21st December, 1965
Asian morning Western music
to VU THI TY
This morning like any other morning
I open the eyes, stretch to greet the flame red sunrays
which have burned the rancour in me for thirty years
love now is sweet, sour and bitter
I cannot remain thoughtless before the big cup of black coffee
part of our diet in the barracks
looking at my lean sihouette
on the hot sands
I sadly think my only amusement in eating rice
dearer to me than my sweetheart'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 cafe on the beach too keen on betrayals
watching her guests with experienced eyes she orders drinks on
their behalf
what will be left in us after years of war
countless rosy lipped youths have died to
preserve bright eyes of yours
I am but a perfect stranger
last night I lived in 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 paasionate 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 in 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 Vung Tau
are ships and carriers
last night there was a hilarious party
for Vietnam , U.S. New Zealand, Australia, the Philippines,
Free China and South Korea
this is why I am often mistaken for another
even by a South Korean girl
I am Vietnmese, I am not a Korean
my skin is yellow and I want to defend my country
as any of my friends of other races
I look in her eyes
as if to tell her we should 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 Eo Quan Vung Tau five years ago
O sweet memory always dear to me
it had been flooding back into my consciouness
to me any Vietnmaese girl is lovable
this is precisely why i worry
because weeping cadets
torment me prior to time of departure
o young soldiers
you will go and I will stay in the 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 meet amidst the futy of fire
as none will bathe twice
in the same river
we will never meet again
like this -- the graduation night
of us all on the sands
dunes and hills crumble away
and the moon shines not for our enjoyment
after your departure
I look around
in the studying, eating an 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 an old man
leaning on the stick
I will sing of memories as a young man
O youths dying with heads broken
where is peace that we eill 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 brothers my loved ones
Birds warnings in the morning in the dreamlike coffea
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 after years
and sounds of music begin wounding my heart
I pray, I pray
so that everything will be all right
and the rosy lips of the bar hostess will not hasten to fade
the lamps on the room will remain lighted
these things, however trivial
all contribute to our happiness
o my love
I am is the sulks on account
of your not so sincere words
though 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
your lips and velvety eyes, though distant awakes me
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 at 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 can I 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 loves you at Saigon and Vung Tau
the salty 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 feel more rancour
the heritage of us two
is 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 can I go on writing
to contribute to our literary heritage
lines of poetry
of bitter mornings and afternoons
surely our country
will lose a poet
with the name The Phong
the sun has risen high
and is shinning straight
into my eyes
music is also fading away
in the morning cafe.
cap Saint Jacques
23rd November, 1965
the phong
<TENGGARA- Vol. 1 -No.2/ 1968 - p. 1-12>
