Little Vietnam Futurist Poem

She came into my view as vivid as
Somebody on a screen in a movie seen,
Elegant in the focus of my eye.

Birdboned. Quick and light. Not wearing pajamas.
The little run resembling playfulness.
Calling out something, screaming something or other

As if her little mouth was fervently singing,
As if you couldn’t hear what the words could be,
Because of the singing. I had her in my sight.

Other people were there, wearing pajamas,
Streaming out of some hideyhole or other
Into the way that that was how I saw them.

The trees of the kind that grew there establish the place.
We know that way the story of what it was.


Source: Poetry (July/August 2011)