det ‘j’, phú bài’
việt nam, 1964
in the mist and fog wet chill
of phú bài’s monsoon winter
tropic cold, the crachin
shrouds wet, relentless, thick
stifling dark graveyard nights
as great grey rats and black,
orange-toothed rattus vietnam,
creep silent, spectral stealthy
inside moldy, rain sagged tents
and onto, into racks to share
the body blanket warmth
of exhausted sleepers who,
in the dawn, wake screaming
as nightmare reality
shreds fantasy’s shivered dreams
in the fading twilight’s dusk
of phú bài’s spring evenings
live trapped rats are taken
to the barren sandy hill
back behind the motor pool
doused with lighter fluid
or sometimes gasoline
before release to cheers
and match or lighter flame
as bets are laid and made
on how far they’ll make the run
before they roll ablaze in balls
of spinning fire on down
to the bottom of the hill
dark roasted, dead and warm
© John Buquoi 2016
This poem is previously unpublished and we are most grateful to John Buquoi for allowing us to reproduce it here.