Twelve white hats bright in the long night
We are not frightened by bullets and bombs in the air
Only by dew wetting our lime-scented hair
Because this book prints the transliterated Vietnamese originals on facing pages, I can tell that "Night Harvest" was written, as Collins renders it, in the European sonnet form, though most of the poems are in free verse, like this one:
Saigon Rain
All at once
I'm drenched
By rain
Saigon rain
Passionate words
Rushing wildly
Letting go like a waterfall
The heavy sky
Curved
Like a man's chest
Breaks open and love
Pours out
Love love
A married woman who can't let go
I'm suddenly sorry the girl I was
Never met the rain
(Lam Thi My Da's poems "Night Harvest" and "Saigon Rain" are from "Green Rice: Poems," translated from the Vietnamese by Martha Collins and Thuy Dinh. Curbstone. Copyright © 2005 by Lam Thi My Da. Translation Copyright © 2004 by Martha Collins and Thuy Dinh.)
