unexpectedly warm
I take off my summer jacket
feeling as if
I were back
in Saigon

Published by

Nu Quang

Nu Quang, a Chinese Vietnamese, grew up during the war and lived under the Communist rule for ten years after Saigon fell. Now a naturalized US citizen, she writes from her background consisting of three cultures. Her tanka have been widely published in both online and print journals. Her haiku and haibun have also appeared in several magazines. She is the winner of the 2012 Jerry Kilbride Memorial English-Language Haibun Contest.

10 thoughts on “”

  1. Le présent et le passé donnent la profondeur à cette poésie. La transition est donnée par "feeling as if"; La structure est parfaitement haïku. Il est rare de voir une telle poésie sur ce site qui donne souvent des haïku qui ne savent pas traiter cette transition, cette rupture.

  2. previously burned
    by the heat of the moment
    now seeking
    much higher latitudes
    and temperate gray days

    thank you, Nu, your evocative poem is well done — and elicits poetry in return :-)

  3. What a powerful poem! "Unexpectedly"indeed. The poet catches us off guard – the same way the moment apparently has caught her. An everyday action as simple as taking off an item of clothing has triggered a series of memories and emotions. Even without reading Nu Quang's background of living under communism in Vietnam, one senses something traumatic. The 3 final lines have a broken rhythm which is clearly deliberate. They have a beat that seems like an insistent, threatening knock on the door. And they read like stifled sobs. Haunting poetry! Thank you Nu for sharing it with us.

    Strider

Respond here