Experience of War

Quietude

As my crossed legs freeze to the thick stone floor
I no longer feel the spinning earth.
I have sat motionless for two years in one spot,
Night after night watching the moon wax and wane
And constellations faithfully bloom every evening
Beyond the trellis of thin bars on the jail window,
An indelible image of stillness
Undisturbed even by the drifting clouds.

In pain and sorrow I sit here,
Placid amidst the moon and stars.
No ocean’s storm or hurricane
Can disturb the high hilltop I am on.

I sit in this temporal world
While moonlight purifies my soul.
The terrestrial pink dust that settles outside the prison door
Does not stain my gray prisoner’s shirt.

I sit here while my cold and numb heart
Continually kindles its fire of faithfulness,
Even though my flesh and bone may turn to stone,
Like that rock that resembles the fabled mother holding her son
Watching for the return of her forever-absent husband
Frozen in her eternal wait atop the mountain.

Translated by Phon-anh