Nobody's Poetaster
poetical musings
Wednesday, October 9, 2024
Tuesday, October 1, 2024
Don't Tell Me
"And if you want the wind of change
to blow about you
and you're the only other person to know, don't tell me
I'm just a singer in a rock and roll band."
- The Moody Blues
How does one comprehend
the scenes of flooding,
washed out roads,
devastated homes,
tears in tired eyes.
While far away in distance,
such a disaster cannot be
far away from one's heart.
Even in the farthest reaches
of my imagination,
I cannot begin to fathom
the pain of those affected.
These thoughts
don't tell me.
Neither can my words explain
or ever know.
Thursday, September 26, 2024
First Draft of My October 9 Opinion Maker Piece
In late April 1975, the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong armies overran Saigon. The U.S. Embassy was hastily abandoned. Thousands of South Vietnamese refugees fled the country. At the time, I was a sailor serving on the USS Parsons with the U.S. Navy’s Seventh Fleet. It was the USS Midway, our sister ship the USS Worden, and other Navy vessels which rescued refugees from Saigon. I certainly remember TV images of American helicopters arriving with refugees from Vietnam and after landing refugees disembarking helicopters which were pushed overboard to make room for more incoming helicopters.
The Parsons remained near Japan. We were told our duty was to protect Japan in case the North Koreans, Soviets, or Chinese took advantage of the fleet being occupied with Operation Frequent Wind, the evacuation of South Vietnam.
A few weeks later, the Parsons arrived in Guam on a cruise to Sydney, Australia for joint exercises with our Australian and New Zealand allies. Thousands of refugees from South Vietnam had been transported to Guam. The island was largely a tent city. The young, the old, men and women were sheltered there. I remember one young Vietnamese woman in particular.
Riding in a Navy pickup truck, a young officer and I went to get movies and videos to entertain the crew on the ship’s closed circuit TV station. As we drove through the refugee camp, a twenty-something woman dressed in a traditional Vietnamese white dress and conical hat stopped us. A young child was near her. I assumed it was her child. She held up a picture to the officer and asked us if we knew the American serviceman in the picture. I presumed that it was her significant other and likely the father of the nearby child.
In the chaos of the evacuation of Saigon, she had apparently been separated from her serviceman. She was now a refugee on a remote island hundreds of miles from her home. Her future was very uncertain. Over the decades, I have frequently thought about that young woman and the child and wondered if she ever found her serviceman. I hope their later life was better than the life of refugees living in a tent at the end of the war.
Today, in many parts of the world, refugees are fleeing war, famine, extreme poverty, and violence. Tens of thousands, maybe millions, are living in refugee camps. Unlike the Vietnamese refugee camp on Guam in 1975, many of these camps do not have adequate food, shelter, or sanitation to accommodate refugees. Some have been in their refugee camp for months, others years. Some arrive in the United States seeking asylum or temporary protected status having escaped the turbulence of their homelands.
I presume that the Vietnamese woman we encountered on Guam in spring 1975 resides to this day somewhere in the continental United States. I wonder if she has empathy for the refugees who have arrived in the United States after fleeing violence, famine, war, or poverty in their home countries. I wonder what she would think about politicians who are critical of refugees, calling them names, implying that they are criminals or somehow subhuman. I wonder if she ever thinks about her childhood home in Vietnam. I suspect that refugees here now long for a time when they felt safe in their home country.
My maternal grandfather died before I was born. He left a small village in Moravia in what is now the Czech Republic to come to America in 1906. His wife, my grandmother and an uncle, arrived six years later in 1912. I assume it was poverty in their small, farming village which brought them to America. It may also have been the turmoil of the soon to collapse Austrian Empire. Grandfather farmed for six years in Michigan to save enough funds for my grandmother’s and uncle’s passage to America. My mother was their first child who survived birth in America. Grandmother died when I was a toddler. I am told she barely spoke English at the time of her death. I sometimes wonder what my grandparents’ small village was like in their day and what it is like to this day.
I believe that most refugees just want to live in peace and have enough resources to safely raise their families just like the rest of us. Please, can we not debate immigration policy respectfully without denigrating those who have been forced to flee troubled homelands?
Sample traditional Viet dress and hat:
Tuesday, September 10, 2024
Faith without works is ...
As if, my sermon for last Sunday:
Thursday, September 5, 2024
Vietnamese Refugees on Guam at War's End
My short reflection for a Villanova on-line course on immigrants and immigration:
In late April 1975, Saigon was overrun by Viet Cong and North Vietnamese troops. Thousands of South Vietnamese fled apparently fearing the revenge of their former enemies. Some Vietnamese on the grounds of the U.S. Embassy in Saigon managed to obtain helicopter rides out to the U.S. 7th Fleet in the nearby Pacific. Eventually, so many helicopters landed on vessels that some helicopters were pushed overboard into the ocean to make landing room for more arriving.
My ship, the USS Parsons, was the only one in the 7th Fleet, based in Japan, that did not steam to the South Pacific to participate in the evacuation. We were told that we needed to stay close to Japan in case the Soviets or others took advantage of the chaos that was Vietnam. About a month after the fall of Saigon, we went on what I like to call a “pleasure cruise”, a voyage to Sydney, Australia. It was early June when we refueled in Guam.
Guam had become a chaotic tent city resided by thousands of Vietnamese. Two of us from Parsons drove a Navy pickup through the refugee camp. A young Vietnamese woman in a traditional dress and hat stopped us. Nearby was a young child. She showed us a picture of an American serviceman and asked if we knew him. I assumed he may have been her partner and the father of the nearby child. Over the decades since, I have often wondered if she ever found the serviceman in her picture.
Untitled
Death, you bastard.
Why you didn't
take me
instead of my child
is a cruelty
I will never forgive of you.
On and until my death bed,
I curse you.
Again, again, and again.
Sunday, September 1, 2024
Convenience Store Clerk
Something like embarrassed that I forgot
to buy milk at the supermarket
just an hour or so earlier,
I headed to the convenience store
for my purchase.
In the parking lot,
I park next to a lone, rusty Toyota Corolla
which must be 25 or 30 years old.
Retrieving a milk gallon from the cooler,
I wait patiently at the counter
as the clerk is busily cleaning
one of those hot dog roller machines
ubiquitous in such stores.
The clerk calls out
"I'll be right there."
"Take your time,
I can see your busy."
Eventually I pay for the milk.
She thanks me for my purchase
and I wish her a Happy Labor Day.
Back in the parking lot,
I realize the rusty, old Corolla is the clerk's.
And I wonder to myself,
what would be for her a fair wage?
Thursday, August 29, 2024
Why write
You may ask why I write.
Hell, why do you breathe?
If I didn't write,
I would not exist.
Words are immortal
they exist long after life itself.
Soccer Haiku
Tonight I'm rooting
for the Chicago Red Stars
who're losing badly.
Thankfully the ref
ends my pain blows her whistle
Soccer haiku sucks.
Friday, August 23, 2024
Summer Waning
On the last Friday before his school year begins,
I sit in the shade of the park's octagonal gazebo
enjoying the shade and breezes
while watching my grandson fish
in the nearby pond;
him hoping for one more shot
at hooking a monster largemouth
and me cherishing the waning summer days.
Birds announce themselves in the woods
and a fawn timidly explores
if its safe to leave their cover
and venture for a drink.
Alas, my grandson's yell to announce the deer
has hastened its escape to the wood.
Summer wanes like that,
not lazily but
at once.