“There’s a man who drinks nothing but memories”: Vietnamese poems: Nguyen Quang Thieu, Nguyen Ba Chung, Thich Nhat Hanh

Posted: November 11, 2012 | Author: | Filed under: English, Nguyen Ba Chung, Nguyen Quang Thieu, Thich Nhat Hanh | Comments Off on “There’s a man who drinks nothing but memories”: Vietnamese poems: Nguyen Quang Thieu, Nguyen Ba Chung, Thich Nhat Hanh

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Nguyen Quang Thieu (Vietnamese poet, born 1957)

“The Inn of Snake Alcohol”

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The snakes are buried in alcohol.

Their spirits creep over the mouth of the jug,

They lie in the bottoms of cups.

Creep on, please creep on through white lips —

Listen:  Drunk is shouting his vagabond song.

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With the top of a hat, with a pair of shoes

With glazed eyes that search the horizon

With anger setting fires in the temple

A whole life stunned by nothingness —

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Like a broken stone, like a bending reed

With the startling turns of a poem

With a frenzy of fears that lick like fire

With the laugh in the sleepwalker’s crying —

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Creep on, spirits of snakes, creep on!

Dazzling venom spurts from the jug.

There’s a man who drinks nothing but memories

Whose veins are the paths of snakes.

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The little inn buries the great night

The forest recalls the name of Autumn

Alcohol carries the spirits of snakes

And Drunk is making a song from his own venom.

 

 

“My Mother’s Hair”

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One of your hairs fell out last night,

a piece of your life was gone without a sound.

I know a difficult day is coming,

my heart, pierced, utters a quiet cry.

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Let my childhood smile again, in the sun,

and turn me into an innocent little headlouse

so I can crawl through the jungle of your hair

and sing a song of darkness in its fragrance.

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Under your fingernail-roof I’ll sleep in my house;

in my black dream I’ll water your black trees.

I’ll pick black fruits, and hair-jungle bees

will bring me black poems to be opened.

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How will I live, without your hair?

How will I breathe without its fragrance?

How will I survive when I am discovered

by ghosts of wooden combs combing your hair?

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Let me wear shows made of dawn-flowers

and crawl without a sound into your sleep.

I’ll take the place of the hair that’s gone

and sing of hair-clouds flying from night to  day.

 

 

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“The Inn of Snake Alcohol” and “My Mother’s Hair”  ©   Nguyen Quang Thieu

Translations from Vietnamese by the poet – with Martha Collins

 

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Nguyen Ba Chung (born 1949, Vietnam)

“Non-attachment”

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Let’s gather every fragment of our memories,

it’s all that we have at the end of our life.

Warring days and nights, showers of sun and rain –

what’s left of love?

Let’s gather what remains of our memories,

it’s all that we have at the close of our life.

Warring days and nights make us wonder:

Should the bundle we gather be empty or full?

 

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Thich Nhat Hanh

(Buddhist monk, poet, peace activist – born 1926, Vietnam)

“For Warmth”

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I hold my face between my hands

– no, I am not crying

I hold my face between my hands

– to keep my loneliness warm

– two hands protecting

– two hands nourishing

– two hands to prevent my soul from leaving me

– in anger.

 

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