Fermentation
Rest and recuperation, relaxation, recreation
whatever it was called it, allowed him to leave
the explosions of green mangoes crashing cluster
bombed from trees, allowed him time to make love
to her day and night in the safety of the dense
tropical scrub at the edge of the jungle
just before he left, which he had promised he wouldn't
she made him snake wine, a freshly killed cobra coiled
and upended in a green-glass jar, poured over with rice
wine, ginseng, shaved roots and crushed herbs, a lid
screwed on tight, to ensure fermentation
she gave him the heart of the snake to swallow live
about the size of his thumb, he can still feel it, if he thinks
about it, which he tries not to, can only imagine
the waterapple sour, overripe yet persimmon astringent taste
of the snake wine he never got to drink, the woman
he lived with as wife but never got around to marrying
doesn't want to remember what happened over there
but when he does, and the memories of her come
pretending have some part in their dying retreat, he can still
feel the living heart, the way it slid way down his throat
bumping along, still beating, slithering to settle in his gut
he doesn't think about it, but his body knows it is there
fermenting, not into wine, but bile.
by Contributing Poet Eileen Malone Copyright © 2017
VWP 2017 First published in VietnamWarPoetry.com
Gone
She kneels in love on a patch of earth
before all that remains of the statue of Lord Buddha
earlier, on a sandbar, she carried her grandchildren
tied on their palm leaf hats, fed them pickles and rice
pointed when a buffalo calf chased a broken reed
their laughs flew over banana groves and bamboo thickets
like starlings flying a black bridge across blue waves of sky
that suddenly bloomed dark with flarebombs
then gone
the guava tree, the fragrance of ripe mangoes
what she taught the children
about honoring even the withered grass on tombs
gone
she kneels in love on a patch of earth
before all that remains of the statue of Lord Buddha
does not ask for what she knows she wants
cannot ask, instead she asks to be taken
nearby small boats carry bright red clay pots and pans
behind bigger ones carrying vats of fish sauce
perhaps to a place that she has never been
she prays that she will find herself there
soon.
by Contributing Poet Eileen Malone Copyright © 2017
VWP 2017 First published in VietnamWarPoetry.com
Rest and recuperation, relaxation, recreation
whatever it was called it, allowed him to leave
the explosions of green mangoes crashing cluster
bombed from trees, allowed him time to make love
to her day and night in the safety of the dense
tropical scrub at the edge of the jungle
just before he left, which he had promised he wouldn't
she made him snake wine, a freshly killed cobra coiled
and upended in a green-glass jar, poured over with rice
wine, ginseng, shaved roots and crushed herbs, a lid
screwed on tight, to ensure fermentation
she gave him the heart of the snake to swallow live
about the size of his thumb, he can still feel it, if he thinks
about it, which he tries not to, can only imagine
the waterapple sour, overripe yet persimmon astringent taste
of the snake wine he never got to drink, the woman
he lived with as wife but never got around to marrying
doesn't want to remember what happened over there
but when he does, and the memories of her come
pretending have some part in their dying retreat, he can still
feel the living heart, the way it slid way down his throat
bumping along, still beating, slithering to settle in his gut
he doesn't think about it, but his body knows it is there
fermenting, not into wine, but bile.
by Contributing Poet Eileen Malone Copyright © 2017
VWP 2017 First published in VietnamWarPoetry.com
Gone
She kneels in love on a patch of earth
before all that remains of the statue of Lord Buddha
earlier, on a sandbar, she carried her grandchildren
tied on their palm leaf hats, fed them pickles and rice
pointed when a buffalo calf chased a broken reed
their laughs flew over banana groves and bamboo thickets
like starlings flying a black bridge across blue waves of sky
that suddenly bloomed dark with flarebombs
then gone
the guava tree, the fragrance of ripe mangoes
what she taught the children
about honoring even the withered grass on tombs
gone
she kneels in love on a patch of earth
before all that remains of the statue of Lord Buddha
does not ask for what she knows she wants
cannot ask, instead she asks to be taken
nearby small boats carry bright red clay pots and pans
behind bigger ones carrying vats of fish sauce
perhaps to a place that she has never been
she prays that she will find herself there
soon.
by Contributing Poet Eileen Malone Copyright © 2017
VWP 2017 First published in VietnamWarPoetry.com
Bio: Eileen Malone's poetry has appeared in over 500 literary journals and anthologies,
three of which have been Pushcart nominations.
Her book-length collection I Should Have Given Them Water was published by Ragged Sky Press (Princeton)
& her award winning chapbook Letters with Taloned Claws was published by Poets Corner Press (Sacramento).
She lives in the coastal fog at the edge of the San Francisco Bay Area.
These poems came to her by way of stories told to her by a Vietnamese manicurist.
three of which have been Pushcart nominations.
Her book-length collection I Should Have Given Them Water was published by Ragged Sky Press (Princeton)
& her award winning chapbook Letters with Taloned Claws was published by Poets Corner Press (Sacramento).
She lives in the coastal fog at the edge of the San Francisco Bay Area.
These poems came to her by way of stories told to her by a Vietnamese manicurist.
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