introduction to ' we promise one another/ poems from an sian war' ( published by the indochina mobile education project, washington d.c. 1971

introduction to ' we promise one another/ 
poems from an asian war.
C.  1971 don luce+ john ,c. schafer 
 + jacquelyn chagnon 


                             introduction to 'we promise one another/
                 poems from an asian war'                                                                                                                          by don luce

                                               introduction to 'we promise one another /..     .(p. 4)
                                                       
These are the poems of the young of Việtnam. They express the hopes and sorrows of  youth which has known only war.  There is little joy. Joy does not come often to a land where brother is sent kill brother.  But there is love which shines through in rare moments. Tragically, the love is often for a friend lost in the war.

There is hatred too.  This is the consequence of brother being pitted against brother.  It is the result of a foreign army trying to protect the corrupt and power hungry.

Underlying all these in these poems is the closeness of the family and the great love for Việtnam.  The respect and veneration of the ancestors is told here, the struggle to be worthy of the family is recorded in the writings of the youth.

These are  the poems that have sent to the young to jail -- and the poems that we written in jail.  Some were smuggled out of the jails like Côn Sơn and Chí Hòa, meticulously copied by hand and passed from youth to youth.  Others were printed in underground newspaers and distributed in the crowded corridors of the schools and at th ecret meeting places of the youth.  Many of the poems have been put top music by the popular young songwriters; Tôn thất Lập, Trịnh công Sơn, Miên Đức Thắng. There are sung wherever the youth meet ... at workd camps, in crowded cafes, by lovers, in the prisons and during street demonstrations.

The Vietnamese love poetry.  Their culture ius best understood by their poems.  Though Vietnamese recognize the superior talent of their especially gifted poets and songwriters, they do not consider poetry and song to be the special property of a small group of literati. They are for everyone.  Farmers, soldiers, and students all write poems.  At the end of the party each person attending is usually expected to sing a song or recite a poem.

The interest in poetry is part of the Vietnamese love and beauty, their devotion to aesthetics, which is evident in their approach to the spiritual as well as the physical world.  They are fond of saying of the particularly courageous and inspiring person that his life more closely intertwined than in Việtnam.

But te outsiders have read the poems and undesrtand the culture of Vietnam.  Few have listened to the voices of the people of Việtnam. We can also appreciate their beauty na the evidence they provide of the courage of a people we can still sing after years of unrelieved sadness and war.

The words  are simple, but there is a depth of meaning.  There are, however, difficulties in appreciating poetry filtered through literary and cultural sensibilities very different from our own. To
many Western readers these poems may seem overly sentimental and even perhaps self-indulgent. We may tire when we hear continually of poor suffering Việtnam, doomed love affairs, prison tortures, war and death.  But one must remember that these are all a part of life in Việtnam to day, and Vietnamese cannot avoid them.  In the poem 'The Present', the poet tells of sitting down to write his girl-
friend a love letter bur finds the word "I love" slanted by the explosion of rockets, shaking his hand holding the pen. He ends by saying " Some day when there's peace/ I kill write to you  different poem."

When one considers all that has happened to Vietnam, it is remar-
kable  that Vietnamese have not lost their ability to hope. In a collection of songs called 'Song from the Devastated Fields', Miên Đức Thắng, a popular young  song writer and singer, expresses  what has happened to his land and people.  These songs, particularly 'Mother , Raise Me to Be a Prisoner', are very critical of Thiêu regime and its American allies.  Miên Đức Thắng was put in prison for singing them, but he does not give in to despair. In the title song, 'Songs from the Devastates Fields', he sings:


             From the devastated fields of today we sing these songs;
                                  Despite a thousand frightful years our life is still happy,
                                  Though weariness is printed on your dry hands,
                                  We will never give up.
                                  Though our fields now are abandoned we will still work for tomorrow,
                                  Though our fields now are destroyed and lie fallow,
                                  Tomorrow flowers will blossom and the future will be bright.
                                  So let us go and recultivate our fields,
                                  So we can live and die in our homeland;
                                  And tomorrow our land will flourish with new ricefields,
                                  Tomorrow our land will be blossom with more smiles,
                                  Tomorrow our land will be greener than the mountains and hills,
                                  For tomorrow we are determined to live in our land.

In the West we are taught to suspect those who wear their hearts on their sleeves. Many of us cling to the belief that an emotional cry from the heart should be restrained and are ashamed or reluctant to give in to our true feelings.  With us there is the real danger that the levels of self-control we achieve may make us forget the validi-
ty of the feeling they are designed to mask.  And it is wrong, it would seem, for Americans who can absorb the horrors of a Mỹ Lai and saturation bombing of a land and people will only ripples of guilt in the face of suffering.  These poems are affirmations of feelings on the part of a people who have long been treated by many Americans as if they had no feelings.  By reading  their poetry we can learn what has if they had no feelings.  By reading their poetry we can learn what has happened to them; and hopefully,what has happened to us. []

(    p.1- 4 WE PROMISE ONE ANOTHER/ poems from an Asian war).



   ---

                          p. 40 WE PROMISE ONE ANOTHER/ ...


                           B U L L E T S
                              By Mien Đức Thắng
                

          Oh,the allied countries have given our people
        Bright pretty bullets made of copper!
        The Vietnamese people need food and clothing,
        So generous allies increase their aid,
        And supply us with more bright pretty bullets.
        The Vietnamese strave to death,
        They cannot eat a million bright pretty bullets.
        We, father and son, meet each other
                            under the flying bullets,
        We, brother, meet each other
                            under the flying cannonballs,
        We, fellow villagers, meet each other
                            under the guns in the square;
        In the name of peace
        The allies support the two regions
        With the bullets of their civilization.    

          (p. 40 WE PROMISE ONE ANOTHER/ poems from an Asian war)
    
    

                                                          Miên đúc Thắng [i.e. Phan văn Thắng 1945-    ]
                                                                                    sinh tại Huế (Trung bộ)
                                                                    -   đãlập gia đình:  1 vợ+ 4 con gái.
                                                                    -   hiện định cư tại CHLB Đức từ 1989
                                                                    -   xuất thân từ các trường đại học Khoa học Saigon
                                                                                         (1965-1967).
                                                                     -  đại học Vạn Hạnh Saigon ( 1968),
                                                                    -  ban Cao học trường đại hoc Dalat (1972)
                                                                  
                                                                   - học nhạc tại trường Quốc gia âm nhạc Saigon,
                                                                                      thấy dạy là nhạc sĩ Văn Giảng.
                                                                   - 1965- 1966 : góp mặt trong tuyển tập 
                                                                                      'Hành trình đồng hương'
                                                                   -  1970 xuất bản 3 cuộn băng 'Việtnam: 1+2+3)

                                                                            các ca khúc tiêu biểu: 

                                                                     -  'Hát từ đồng hoang'(1960)
                                                                    - ' Lớn mãi không ngừng (1965) ...
                                                                    -   ' Sống chờ '  (2005)  v.v...

                                                                                    (ảnh+ tiểu sử:  Nguyễn Việt)