I have a very long poem in the middle of my book called
"The Boat People," so I'm just going to read some sections from
it.
A lot of this poem is just based off of research I did.
I was reading-- I interviewed family members.
I also read a lot of old newspaper articles between
the '70s and '90s after the war.
So I was reading a lot of accounts of people, especially
people refugees, trying to come to the US
and leave Vietnam on boats.
So a lot of this is pulled from--
inspired by that research,
The Boat People.
She googles FOB after someone calls her fresh off the boat.
She has never been on a boat.
What she finds blank deaths from blank to blank,
Blank memorials in blank countries.
On open water, they traveled on small fishing junks
Origami boats
Arms and legs folded
One over the other
Trawlers
Smuggling thousands of
Bodies
Searching for international
Water
Living on empty
For weeks and months,
Looking for coastline
That did not push back.
Vietnamese boat people memorial,
Asian garden of peaceful eternity.
The man and old woman,
The young mother and child
Frozen in bronze turned blue green.
Four figures so soaked,
They have become the waterlogged wrinkles of their clothing.
Four figures on the raft
Floating in a fountain shaped like the body of a boat.
Their bodies submerging above water.
The young woman's outstretched hand reaching back in time.
Around the fountain lay 54 stones,
Each inscribed with names.
A small portion of the dead.
Interview Number One.
The former boat person stated that
As many as 20 ships passed by without stopping and coming
to their aid,
Ignoring their cries for help.
When they finally saw shore,
The refugees sank the boat with their bodies,
Pounding their hands and feet so that they could not
be towed away.
The people smugglers speak.
They come to us with black market gold,
Whole life savings, homes sold,
They, the soon-to-be defectors.
They will say they're going on holiday or nothing at all.
They will disappear in the middle of the night,
Walk through mud and green jungle,
reappear in darkest morning.
Some commissioned their own boats,
traveling Petri dish of human waste, fever dream.
We know men who have tried to leave many times
Only to be turned back.
Bad weather, bad feeling,
They will not give up.
They would squander their life savings a dozen times,
Anything for the chance of freedom,
the promise of blue ocean.
Can you define a refugee?
A refugee seeks refuge.
Interview Number Six.
I did not want to go back.
When they took us to the plane, it was over very quick.
We owned almost nothing still, after seven years,
The men brought their fists together, desperate,
We dragged our feet, refused to walk.
There were bodies against their barricade,
we're met with water cannon.
The men were rolled into blankets, loaded into the cabin
Like a cigarette in the plane's mouth, a stilled bullet.
Vietnamese Boat People Memorial,
Captain Burke Park.
A mother holds her son's hand.
On the other hand, a bird in mid-flight looks at the mother.
The boy looks the other way.
It is impossible to tell which direction is future.
Which past.