Friday, June 7, 2024

NAM LE ~





36 Ways of Writing a Vietnamese Poem


 [1. Diasporic]



In English, mind You.

You dink I write Yiknamee?

Shame on You.

It was Your violence dumbed me


Smeared me, reaved me —

Your war I don't remember

And won't let You forget —

Moved me


From place and sufficiency.

From everything I didn't know

I didn't know

I would've known


You would've known.

Dis place ment

Everything to me

Before the power went


Home. Shame on me.

What do I know?

What's Vietnamese in me

Could fit in a poem.



________________

Nam Le

36 Ways of Writing a Vietnamese Poem

Knopf 2024