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THE WRITERS POST (ISSN: 1527-5467) VOLUME 8 NUMBER 2 JUL 2006 |
DU TU LE _____________________________________ THE
PLACE WHERE MOTHER RETURNED (translated by Thien Nhat Phuong &
Tran Le Khanh)
how could you know I had dreams flying over the Ha Nam – Ha Noi route together with salt-laden boats and bamboo-loaded barges they carried my soul drifting along the river of Day and the faithfulness of my mother also had no bottom how could you know I had dreams awakened, I still imagined a train had just departed for Ha Dong the place where my mother was born and grew up then left for good with her husband. My maternal village is still a mystery to me Like silk threads strung over the sky I tried many times but could never catch them how could you know I had dreams seeing Mother return to cover me with a blanket to stroke my hair with gentle pat so many years disappeared behind us but my mother could never believe her son’s young hair could turn so white; lines crisscross his dark forehead his eyes are now blurry (those clear eyes that in the old days followed my
mother’s steps whenever there was a market day) these same eyes are now beaten by sun and rain. She asked me why my hair went white And why the veins surfaced on my wrinkled skin. I asked Mom how was she doing, my mother smiled, her lips lined red with chewed betel leaves she always looked sad like the day my dad left forever. how could you know I had dreams awakened, I still lingered in my childhood on Tran Hung Dao street the house numbered 1029 with some high trees in front in Saigon, where some Chinese wearing shorts pulled up their yellowish undershirts and mumbled while exposing their fat bellies. how could you know I had dreams flying again and again over Tran Binh Trong street, where every dawn I passed by a Catholic church named Huyen Si leading toward my school there were benches there were blackboards where friendship blossomed for the first time, thanks to this friendship I learned to love you how could you know I had dreams awakened, I still hear the ocean waves murmuring somewhere Hai Phong? Do Son? Vung Tau? Ha Tien? Guam? The place where I lay under the sun naked on one of the sand dunes the place where a 15 years old girl named Thu once attended French school, she told me in French that I was her first love while in the bushes, we embraced as lovers Thu sadly asked where my mother was? how could you know I had dreams lining up in the morning for meals at Camp Pendleton the place where shuttle buses regularly ran to connect Processing Center with Camp One a very thin girl sitting on the same bench asked if I was the one who just came in a few days ago she recited: “congratulations to you on your new birthday, candles of pain were burned to fill up your joy.” the engine noises, the wind howling, the woodpecker hammering, the laughs and cries, the voices from the broadcast stations searching for
relatives and the panting breaths in the newly developed breast of the girl dissolved on the brink of the abyss. I led her to the valley bottom where by peacefully laid bunches of oak twigs beaten by the wind she mumbled the remaining sentences of the poem entitled birthday, December I asked why, at her age, she was prone to self-destruction she smiled a smile like the crack in a young fruit! she answered me her childhood was just like that. while passing by the dinner hall I saw my girlfriend in line waiting to bring her meal to the barrack she looked as thin as a leaf pressed in a book I learned later that she was then pregnant for more than a month. I wondered about the girl named Thao did she still live in San Jose? as for my girl friend she was now married and raising my two children well. how could you know I had dreams repeating like a worn-out tape with the abrupt and crackling sounds like the short street of Ranchero Way where cars need not turn back, like the house with an immense garden where many times my Mom sat at the foot of the lime tree she used to ask: “why is this tree full of limes? beware of thieves, my child!” like the young with rainy eyes, and long stormy hair who had left forever leaving behind her curses. how could you know I had dreams returning to muddy Cau Ong Lanh market with its strong odors: the smell of rotten fish. Smell of mud. Smell of trash the smell of agonizing bodies waiting for death the smell of sweat. Smell of the senseless tears. The smell of the sweater worn by the girl who carried
Virgin Mary’s Picture. She lived a legendary life Sustained by pages of letters Rather than a life of reality. The road with a coffee shop, open late at night; Rumor said while novelist Le Van Truong was alive, He called it the Frontier Inn. The shop where I hung out most of my teenage life With my friends (many of them, when very young, died like Hoai Lu, like Hoang Dinh Tap…) the place where I returned when my worn-out hair turned white with the late tears of a young woman embodying The Goddess of Mercy that place where I missed the smell of Westminster street which led toward the sea the scent of hair soaked with the hospital smell, Lam, the smell of trembling fingers at the base of a woman’s
white breast. The smell of the woman’s tears (the woman whom I like to call Huu) the smell of the row of “gang” on a rainy day. The smell of short hair The smell of the beef noodle shop Where I used to eat with my friends early in the morning And the Chinese noodle restaurant not too far away. how could you know I had dreams of countless birds. And about mountains the maple forest. Some old letters. Nobody even bothers To ask where am I? Everybody is busy. No one has spare time To ask who am I? And where do I live on this earth that is drying out And why is life turning so dark so fast? how could you know I had dreams awakened, I still remembered the day when my mother died in the hospital she had not tasted neither a tiny noodle thread, nor a bowl of beef noodle, nor a bowl of seafood noodle; or even a boiled duck embryo or a small piece of fried fish and now, I eat them everyday, those fish and eggs like the returning of Spring like the Garden Grove Street cutting through Magnolia and through Brookhurst… but my dear, everything has now changed because you, as well as Mother, are no longer. DU TU
LE The Writers Post &
literature-in-translation, founded 1999,
based in the US. Editorial note: Works published in this issue are simultaneously published in the printed Wordbridge magazine (ISSN: 1540-1723). Copyright © Du Tu Le & The Writers Post. Nothing in this magazine may be downloaded, distributed, or reproduced without the permission of the author/ translator/ artist/ The Writers Post/ and Wordbridge magazine. Creating links to place The Writers Post or any of its pages within other framesets or in other documents is copyright violation, and is not permitted. |
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