"Too hot, too hot."
Did you think to find traitors
burrowed into my muscles
like so many parasitic worms?
Should my small size seem somehow sinister?
Even smaller than you,
who are small enough.
Fit to tunnel
in the walls of your tunnels,
to pop out,
surprise!
Are we a wee army?
Do we lay in wait for you,
marbles in hand,
to pelt you with questions
which slay you?
Kim Phuc, the napalm girl, lives in Canada now, having survived the napalm attack by a South Vietnamese pilot. She was assisted in receiving medical care by South Vietnamese photographer, Nick Ut, who won a Pulitzer Prize for the photo. Here is a BBC News article about the incident in the words of Nick Ut.
This is excruciating - and ever important. Thank you for choosing this to write about, which you do poignantly.
ReplyDeleteStrong poem. Well written.
ReplyDeleteThis picture has always haunted me... such inhumanity... I hate war...
ReplyDeleteThank you for this very powerful poem...
You use some really unique imagery in this poem -- the muscles and the marbles are my favorites. I've got to say, it's pretty brave to write about *this* image, and you do so very well.
ReplyDeleteVery hard hitting poem. I did not need to see the image. It stays etched in mind forever.
ReplyDeletegautami
Meditating for being one with you
Good for you for choosing this. It's a horrific image, forever engraved in my mind. "to pelt you with questions" is right, on.
ReplyDelete