Dept. of English / Univ. of Malaya
Kuala Lumpur/ Malaysia
1- Nguyen Quoc Thai
[ Nguyễn quốc Thái 1943- ]
Translated from the French
by Chan Soo Ping*
My Country and Points for Questioning
Often I am sad and often I ask myself the question:
To whom does this country belong at this present hour?
The days when the bullets whistle all round the towns
and when the frail bamboos are smeread with flesh and blood.
For the ten, twenty years this war had lasted
our children have almost lost the power of smiling,
Often I am said and often I ask myslef the question :
How many springs would it cost my country ?
The clang of armour, dismal as the tide
The roar of planes, ominous as the storm
I hear, and often I say myself, not knowing how to cry ;
We have lost our brothers one by one.
Each noon, when the still sun gilds Saigon,
I consider the future so dim, so distant,
and the old mother, her eyes brimming with tears,
musing over coming battles and her children.
Winter brings forth an abundance of cold clouds
The sun sinks like youths
Often I gaze around and terror seizes me:
Till when will my country remain in this mosfortune ?
Poor country, poor Vietnam,
Often I am said and often I ask myself :
How many times could you rejoice at independence
and how many times proclaim liberty
--------
* The originals of these poems are in Vietnamese. They are translated into French as follow : "My country and Points for Qustioning " by R.P Nguyen Ngoc Lan ; "Wild Grass" by Lê van Hao ; " Oh! This is Nothing " by Lê van Hao -- the English translations here published were done from the French by Chan Soo Ping.
And, "Wild Grass by Ta Quang Trung" +" This is for my son not yet born and named by Hoang Khoi Phong" are in Vietnamese, translated into English by Dam Xuan Can.[]
2- Tạ Quang Trung
Translated from the the vietnamese
by Dam Xuan Can
Wild Grass
I have resigned to my loneliness
like a star lost at the edge of the universe
sailing in darkness
with anguish and sorrows
loves and hates,
with fading ideals ;
and deeds which meet defeat ;
for I have resigned myself to be a blade of wild grass
that grows and increases in this corner of the land.
And I have lulled myself to a deep sleep
of a mass of empty promises ;
in prison the awareness of liberty excerts itself ,
the dream of paradise flowers in hell.
And I have seen the soul decay
and the body tire
and my two hands wasted
and my past defiled
by more than one treachery .
I have resigned myself to be an anonymous blade of grass
in the botanical garden
which the giant's hell tramples on without pity.
So many times has hatred possessed me
when the will has wished in overcome fate
and the mind has carried this bitterness
of anonymous grasses, insignificant ,
trampled underfoot as a a nation is trampled.
And I have seen myself awakened, wild of looks
gazing at buds withered
and trees parched
by the fires of days and years .
Reduced to this vegetable state ,
I pray in silence
that my remain forever a blade of grass
which grows on this dear land
to bear all the outrages in store for the little and the weak ,
all the humiliations of todays .
3- Du Tu Lê
[ i.e. Lê cự Phách 1942 - ]
Translated from the French
by Chan Soo Ping
Oh ! This is nothing
I have already told you, sleep my little love ,
The bullets crack constantly but they crack so far away
Even if their loud din sounds near tomorrow
That will change nothing, nothing will shock us
Not suprising is it, indeed, since we came into the world
The bullets have cracked in our honour, the fires have
raised their flames of joy
The days have suffered, the nights have sobbed
And in the heart of the land
So many and so many looks of terror
So many and so many feet have dragged
So many and so many fingers have prepared to pull the trigger
The threatening air
Now the rows of barbed wire warn my friends and I who have
almost given up
And the trumpet sounds harass us, they drive us mad .
I have already told you, sleep my little love
Oh all this, it is nothing, such has life been for a good long time
Such is life, it is nothing, don't you know ?
When one dies young
When the killed in action is only a chap under twenty-one ,
What is left for him to bring to the world beyond ?
The rifle is too bulky for him to keep ;
And he surely does not have the heart to give the unused grenades
to his parents .
Happiness has never been fully within his tiny grasp .
And love is merely a vague thing in his splatered brain .
He aks himself why the must die,
Truth, as usual, remains hidden till the agony.
All of a sudden he realises his youthfulness;
All of sudden he senses the futile deat ;
Alas, everything is too late ,
And his only reward is his very last breath.
The soul is fading away, but the eyes are still turning backwards
On his footsteps
Countless people are dutifully followin .
4- hoang khoi phong
[i.e nguyễn vinh hiển 1943 - ]
Translated from the vietnamese
by Dam Xuan Can
This is for my son not yet born and named
I am tewnty four. I am not married, but have many sweethearts ;
Yet as a man I must think of the future ,
I will get married to one whom I love .
Problably I will then be twenty- eight and your mother just
turned twenty.
On the wedding night I will pretend to forget I am a soldier
I will whisper to your mother about my long-cherished pkan ;
At last you will see the day .
But the war will in all likehood outlast my life ,
So I must think of your future in the very first with your mother .
When you are born you will be as beautiful as your mother and
more intelligent than I am ;
You'll carry out my plan bravely ,
I am sure I cannot be with you always ,
In war bullets are insentisive .
These words you'll see and grasp through your mother
When you're about to enter high school
I want to say frankly to you
You'll be with your mother more often .
Because of one or another reason
(infancy or the war for instance)
She is very clever
while I am but a soldier .
All the time I wish your life were different from mine .
I won't be able to give you a handsome amount of money ;
I hope you'll have a happy childhood
Because I knew of battles and their tragic aftermath as a child .
Whatever the situation your mother and I wish you to finish
high school
In the event of the call-up you'll be an officer
- it's better that way.
It is good for you to learn one of the arts;
Poetry, writing or painting enables you to express yourself;
Music makes you relaxed and unlikely to indulge in delusions
of youth.
Don't be like me. I hope in the pub whenever a fight end;
I drink to forget the slaughter and to down sadness;
Do you know drinking only makes my sadness more acute.
Your mother reproaches me a lot, but she gives in soon,
After all she prefers meeting me in a pub than in gambling dens
of brothels
It is not because I do not love her,
I love her more than myself.
But I am a soldier,
And the war does, short of killing me body and soul when
I am away from her
It is very good for you to know an art.
I know artists suffer a lot in a small and weak country,
They simply are not free and do not have enough to eat --
I want you to express your feelings and pave the way for
those coming after yon.
This is the reason I am writing these lines to you.
In case I die
before the war ends,
You'll be a mona then. You'll fight in my place to achieve peace.
If I die
and peace returns,
Praise peace,
Denounce war. But in deadly seriouness,
I must say to you,
Rebuilt the nation
Regain your pride.
You should concern yourself with this all your life.
Without any help from me, you should know yourself.
[]
(TENGGARA 4 - p. 37 - 41.)
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