Pham Ho

Beautiful and Loving Days Gone By

I shot him.
The beautiful and loving days gone by
Could not stop me.
Perhaps he had forgotten those days
But I remember still
The rice fields of my village, the endless sea of rice,
The morning dew like the pearls on the sides of the road,
And the two of us,
Our school books together in one bag,
Our clothes rumpled by sleep,
Our bare feet moving side by side.
In our swinging hand, the handful of rice
Our mothers rolled into a leaf of the areca palm.
Our wide conical hats had long chin straps.
In our pockets, a matchbox, a cricket inside…
How beautiful how gentle the days gone by.
And yet those days held no future for us.
Many years ago
He left our village to join the enemy.
I'm sad and I'm angry.
I met him.
I shot him.
The beautiful and loving days gone by
Could not stop me.

His body lay on the dike,
No longer the boy I had known.
I looked at his face
Grieved for the boy I had lost.