(English version from 'Vết Tích Chiến Tranh')
Did you see on a narrow dirt
road
the wind blew those broken trees
In the midst of this cold
wind I had come back
to hear only the echoes
repeat
Did you see where the war
that takes
my young love, her breath,
her dream
Have you seen from the eyes
that shut
a constant stream of sad tears
flow
It’d have stopped if each leaf
in this vast
jungle hold those droplets of
pain
Which bullets had torn her apart?
which bombs blew the earth she
loves?
I’ve cried for so many lives that lost
yet no explanation to lift off
sorrows!
Da Lat 1968
Translation – Norman 4/2008
Vết Tích Chiến Tranh
Trông con đường nhỏ ưu phiền
Hàng cây cũng đứng triền miên
tủi hờn
Ta về gió buốt từng cơn
Gọi em tiếng mất tiếng còn
vang xa
Chiến tranh cướp tuổi ngọc ngà
Mắt em ngơ ngác lệ sa đầm đìa
Lá rừng đọng giọt sương khuya
Đạn bom cay nghiệt xẻ lìa châu
thân
Ôm em thương xót căn phần
Trái tim còn những phân trần
khôn nguôi.
Nhật Thụy Vi
Đà Lạt 1968
Commentary by Kathy Ho 2/15/2015
This poem is full of potent
feeling of tragedy. The harshness of the narrator’s feelings come out in the
trochaic speech and masculine endings. This poem is an endeavor to express the
effects of war on the narrator. The poem then starts to shift to the effects of
war on the narrator’s physical state until the poem delves into the effects of
war on the narrator’s mental state. The narrator starts with the imagery of a
narrow road and a row of sad, broken trees. This is probably an attempt to show
the effects of war on the environment around the narrator. The narrator is
standing in a cold, sharp wind and questioning why they had come back to this
place to hear the echoes of what they had lost. Next, the narrator tells how
the war affected them physically, how it had stolen their precious youth and
their dear future. They tell how war caused their eyes to cry streams of tears
and of how all the leaves in the jungle cry with them late into the night. The
narrator then tries to personify the bonds between people. They say that the
bullets and bombs of war had the cruel effect of severing the ties that people
hold with others; they divide friends and family. The narrator then expresses
the extreme anguish they feel for those effected by the war. The effect of this
descent into anguish is to demonstrate that those things (bonds, youth, future)
are the casualties of war. They are what is sacrificed and lost in war. War has
robbed people of their youth, deprived them of their future, and denied them
their bonds and what is left are the scars of war.
Commentary by Elizabeth Hwang
Elizabeth_Hwang Feb 22, 2015
I think it’s really amazing
how you were able to do your poetry project using Vietnamese poems. Even though
our poems are from different countries, I can still imagine that it was
challenging to interpret the Vietnamese culture and figurative language. The
“Scars of War” used beautiful imagery and your explanation really clarified it.
My favorite line is, “It would have stopped if each leaf in this vast
jungle hold those droplets of
tears.” I further saw how the author felt when she shared the number of tears
shed and how there were so many that all of the leaves would have to capture
the droplets. She clearly shows how the war hurt her. It took so much away from
her and her bright future, but what she seems to be the saddest about is losing
ties to family. I know that most Asian families are very close to one another and
it must have been devastating for her to lose those connections. I also
thoroughly enjoyed “Sunset on Glacier Bay.” It was so much fun reading a poem
conveying their love for nature because I love nature too! I think it’s really
neat how significantly nature influences people. I also agree that it should be
appreciated to the fullest extent.
Commentary
josephk97 Feb 20, 2015
I think that your analysis on
"Scars of War" was spot on and it helped me a lot with understanding
what the poem was about and the purpose of why it was written. It's always
interesting reading poems that is written in another language because there's a
challenge with talking about the poetic devices and the meaning of the poem
even with a translation, but you did an excellent job at that. Your analysis
was spot on, but you could have quoted the poem more. but you did a good job
talking about the imagery used in the poem. I can agree with your statement
that the poem is full of tragedy. I also liked how you talked about the meter used
and how it there were masculine endings to show that the poem was about
tragedy. I agree that wars can leave scars on people because just imagining
being in one is painful because people can die during wars and go through
painful events that are stressful and a lot to handle. The fact that the author
talked about how a war affects a person's physical and mental state, and the
fact that you talked about what the author said about it was excellent and spot
on. I agree with what your analysis says and it was helpful with helping me
understand the meaning of the poem. The imagery helped tremendously. I think
you could have talked about more poetic devices but other than that, again,
your analysis was spot on and it was helpful.
