1

Rain strikes plantains
I see no tears fall
Only these wet still-lifes
Left behind

Vietnam is melancholy

2

Late at night
In a movie by Chen Yingxiong
I discover
A melancholy Vietnam
Remembering the rain falling
On the screens of the black-and-white films
Deep in my memory

3

In a long poem I once wrote:
“Is war truly romantic
She looks good posing with the gun
As if playing a harp”

Writing <The Road Home>
Writing about a Vietnamese beauty
Who saddens me

4

I want to verify the melancholy
Of Vietnam with a friend
Who’s been to Vietnam
But I just think about it
My friend
Is not melancholic
But the crux of it is he’s
Not a person capable of sensing sorrow

5

Speaking of “south of the clouds”
Vietnam is the south of this south of the clouds
It’s the frontier of the land of clouds
And beneath the clouds
A great river rushes to the sea

6

Some have taken this as a metaphor
For a moist vagina
The beauty of it is: America
This cock that pokes into everything
Suffered a rupture here
And since then this self-important man
Suffers serious sexual dysfunction
Like Ernest Hemingway

7

How could I dare belittle
The men here
Only using their militia to leave so many
Of my compatriots in graves on hillside after hillside
That was entirely down to us
I’m not saying “a righteous army is bound to win”
I want to say: A melancholy man
Is the bravest soldier

8

Vietnam is melancholy

Rain strikes plantains
I see no tears fall
Only these wet still-lifes
Left behind