From ticky@gladstone.uoregon.eduThu May  4 20:53:11 1995
Date: Thu, 4 MAY 1995 16:51:03 -0700 
From: Satjadham <ticky@gladstone.uoregon.edu>
Newsgroups: soc.culture.laos
Subject: Re: My poem. (fwd) 


Where is Home?

No home for me
I am a refugee.

Forced to escape 
the land of my birth, 
I met a new land as a child.
And I am lost.

Is home this
land of the free?
Is home where I 
was taught to have 
a voice:
Where as a woman
I can roam, and roar
as loud or as soft
as I please?
Is home here, with the
founding fathers,
the pop-star idols,
the homecoming queens,
and the crushed, red coke
cans on the street?
Is it this land of money,
power, and frozen TV dinners?
Is this home?

Or was 
Home the land of the "ai nhong,"
the communists?
Was it there, the place where 
even their shadows killed?
Where Mother rocked me
asleep while monsoons 
came for dinner?
Was home the Mekong River--
"nam khong," 
Dark from the countless baths
it gave ot my ancestors,
Deep through time and natural 
erosion,
Muddy by the blood
of soldiers battling conquerer 
after conquerer?

Home.  Is there
One for me?

A place no where 
on earth.
A place I will have
to create.

For yes, there will be a home for me, 
I will not be just a refugee.

Soudary Kittivong '94
Comments and questions?  Please email to laolit@tuddy.cc.monash.edu.au
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