I'll just end with this short poem.
Thank you so much for having me.
My mother is illiterate.
And I always imagine what she would
say if she could write a poem.
And so I wrote a poem in her voice.
It begins with a Vietnamese proverb,
Khong co gi bang com voi ca.
Khong co gi bang ma voi con.
"Head First."
Don't you know a mother's love neglects pride
the way fire neglects the cries of what it burns?
My son, even tomorrow, you will have today.
Don't you know there are men who touch breath
as they would the tops of skulls,
men who carry dreams over mountains,
the dead on their backs?
But only a mother can walk with the weight of a second beating
heart.
Stupid boy.
You can get lost in every book.
But you'll never forget yourself the way God forgets his hands.
When they ask you where you're from,
tell them your name was flushed from the toothless mouth
of a war woman.
That you were not born but crawled
head first into the hunger of dogs.
My son, tell them the body is a blade that sharpens by cutting.
Thank you.