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  Apr 2019 L B
jake aller
Seeing Ghosts

I walk around the streets
Of old Saigon
Seeing sensing the undead

The ghosts of the war
That haunted life
So many years ago

So many people died
For a war
That never should have been fought
For reasons that are still not clear

A great tragedy unfolded
In a land half away
Around the world

The ghosts smile at me
And then they disappear

Leaving me in the present
Life goes on

Old Ghosts  

Old ghosts wandering the streets of old Saigon
Lost spirits of the dead
Died during the endless wars  
Ghostly apparitions around every corner

Here was Kilroy
and his gang of soldiers
Over there were the Viet Cong
Waiting to **** them

Saigon is filled with memories like that
Terrible times were had here in Old Saigon
Silently the ghosts parade the city streets
As the tourists drink in the bars



Mastering the Saigon Shuffle

When I first visited Saigon
Learning the Saigon Shuffle
Was difficult

And now 24 years later
It all seems to be coming back

There is an art to crossing the street
Dodging the motor cyclists, the taxis, the private cars
The bikes and other pedestrians and the buses

The art consists of letting the big guys go first
Then walk between the motorcycles and cyclists
Trusting that they will get out of your way

And they being masters of the Saigon shuffle
Always find a way

In my two visits I was struck
By how it all flows together

Without a central authority
And with almost no planning
Lights or cops

Somehow it just is
And somehow it works

And it is still a mystery to me
24 years after first
Encountering the Saigon shuffle

Coffee Lady
Every morning
I have gone out for Vietnamese coffee
At a sidewalk café
Down the ally from our AIRBNB

The owner is a pleasant middle age woman
Who for some reason likes us
She smiles at us
Greets us in Vietnamese
She does  not understand English
Or Korean

And I wonder why
Why was there this connection
Between us

It dawned on me
Perhaps in a prior life
She knew an American or two
And I remind her of someone

Or perhaps she is found
Of Korean K drama
And Angela reminds her
Of her favorite K Drama star

Or perhaps it is both
Or another reason entirely

But I moved today
And will miss her

Might go back for a final cup
Of coffee

To say good bye
To my Vietnamese coffee lady

Mostly Harmless Old Lady in the Alley
There is an old Vietnamese lady
In the neighborhood
Obviously senile

But everyone knows her
And watches over her

To make sure
She stays out of traffic
And out of trouble

She talks to everyone
But no one seems to understand
What she is babbling on about
They smile at her
And she smiles back

Reminds me of the phrase
From the hitchiker’s guide to the galaxy
Mostly harmless

And she for some reason
She likes us
And like my Vietnamese Coffee lady

I wonder why
Why was there this connection
Between us

It dawned on me
Perhaps in a prior life
She knew an American or two
And I remind her of someone

Or perhaps she is found
Of Korean K drama
And Angela reminds her
Of her favorite K Drama star

Or perhaps it is both
Or another reason entirely

But in any event
I look forward
To seeing her smiling face
Every time I walk
Down my ally way

Avoiding the War Due to Two Birthdays

I avoided being drafted
Due to a fluke in my birth certificate
In 1974 the last draft was held
And some people were drafted

But no one went to Vietnam
The war was ending by then
I avoided the draft though
To no effort on my own

My number came up on the draft list
My real birthday was in the zone
But then my mother pointed out
That my legal birthday was different

When I was born at 4 am
The night clerk typed up
My birth certificate
With the wrong date

My father pointed that out
She said
Once I typed it
That is it

His birthday will be
What I typed
Get use to it
My father gave up

And so, 18 years later
That saved me
From the last draft
Never made it to Vietnam

Many years latter
I visited Vietnam
Right after we opened relations

Glad I finally got to see
The country
That so many Americans visited
so many decades ago

Buddha In Vietnam

In Saigon I saw the buddha
Buddha images are everywhere
Temples are scattered about
Here and there and everywhere

Buddha lives on
In the hearts and minds
Of the Vietnamese soul

The communists tried
To get rid of Buddhism
And other religious traditions

But they failed
And Buddhism has come back
Still speaks to the Vietnamese people

A different style
A different vibe
Than Korean Buddhism

But still Buddhist thought
Prevails in the tropical lands
Of the South


Mekong Dreams

Traveling along the Mekong
Back in time

Seeing the river
The people
Imagining life on the river
Imagining the war
The past in the Mekong delta

And the present tourist boom
Yet life goes on
With its own laid back rhythm

As we traversed the river
We were transported back
To an earlier time

Following the ancient rhythms
Of the Mekong Delta


Down and Out in Saigon

Southeast Asia, and Mexico
has always attracted
A certain type of westerner
The down and out
On a down word spiral

Why?
Relatively cheap to live
Lots of part time gigs
Teaching English
Or other things

*****, drugs, ***
Readily available
And cheap

Places to stay
Dirt cheap
And no one needs
To sleep out doors

Easy to disappear
Into the foreigners backpackers ghettos
And escape
From whatever you are running from

The locals are somewhat tolerant
The police usually look the other way
And there are lots of people
In your shoes

I was surprised to find
That Saigon has become
The latest place
For the down and outer crowd
To gather together

In Bangkok one sees them a lot
In Cambodia as well
In the Philippines
In Nepal

And south of the border
In Mexico as well

In India not so much
In Japan and Korea
Just too **** expensive
And too cold to be outdoors

Back in the day
I used to work
The citizen services gig
And saw lots of the down and outer set

The old song comes to mind
No one remembers you
When you are down and out

And in the States
Being down and out
Means living on the mean streets

As it is very difficult
To live with almost no money

And the various side hustles
Don’t give you much money
Unless you are dealing drugs

And teaching ESL
Is not an option

Food is expensive
Transportation is expensive
***** and drugs expensive
Rent is prohibitive
Commercial *** is expensive

And no one loves you
If you are down and out
No one knows your name
You are just another homeless ***

Invisible to all
As you try to make do

Much better to be down and out
In Southeast Asia
Than on the mean streets
Of the USA


Ghosts of Chu Chi

Crawling down the tunnels
Of Chu Chi
I could almost imagine
The Viet Kong guerillas

Hiding deep under the tunnels
As the land above is turned
Into a temporary dessert

With the vegetation burned off
By ****** and agent orange

The Viet Kong creep out at night
Stealing onto the bases
Stealing weapons, food, supplies
And occasionally killing soldiers

In their sleep
The US soldiers
Stay on base at night

Terrified of the mosquitos
And of the Viet Kong

the ghosts
Surround me
Telling me their stories
And at last I fled

Through the emergency escape tunnel
Declaring victory
Profoundly shaken up
By the ghosts of the Chu Chi tunnels


Saigon 2019

Saigon 2019

Vibrant, vivid, exciting
A city on the move
Becoming a world class city
Yet still with a Saigon swagger

Wandering the streets
Dodging the traffic
Admiring the women
Enjoying the food

Saigon enters my heart
And I know that I will be back
This city is growing on me
Reminds me of Korea back in the 1990’s

One hopes that as it develops
It will not become a carbon copy
Of other big Asian cities
Obliterating its past

In search of a false modern image
I hope it can retain
What makes Saigon Saigon
And not become another Gangnam

Hope it does it with Saigon style
And the people will evolve
The country will emerge
And become what it should be

The Paris of the East
This is my vision
Saigon 2019



Saigon 1995

Saigon 1995

In 1995
I was one of the first tourists
Allowed in to Vietnam
To freely wander about

Tourism was at its infancy
And Saigon was chaotic
Wild and crazy
Traffic was insane

There were few tourism sites
Few hotels
Few guest houses
And not too many restaurants

The food was good
We saw the war memorial
The re-unification palace
And the big market

But we felt we were being monitored
Beggars were everywhere
There were scams everywhere
And it was not that pleasant an experience

But Saigon grew up
Became a much more tourist-friendly place
And these problems we encountered
A thing of the place

Saigon is so much better
So much more developed
That it has captured our soul
And we will be back
poems inspired by my second trip to Saigon in 24 years
  Apr 2019 L B
IZ J
I be me
Me I be

That Me-I-Be!
That Me-I-Be!
I do not like
That Me-I-Be!

Do you like?
setting yourself free

I do not like it
That Me-I-Be
I do not like
setting myself free

Would you like it
Here or there?

I would not like it
Here or There
I would not like myself
Anywhere
I do not like
being free
I do not like it
Me-I-Be

Would you like me if I was quiet?
Would you like me if I caused a riot?
I do not like me
Me-I-Be
I do not like
The being free
My choices when free don't seem up to me
I do not like it
That Me-I-Be
  Apr 2019 L B
Elijah Bowen
in this expanse,
painted sky dripping its
dinner-plate-scraped hues
of honey,
and pyramids.
I am breathing, alive,
filling my chest with
air sped past
delicious and addictive,
keeping my lungs drunk with these
gulps of a larger place.
untied, peering out
from above the road,
I open my arms.
let them course through
the quickly fading sights.
a myriad of life
spreading out
constantly
in every direction.
land that races
out hazily for
hundreds of miles, unfolding.
anonymous houses
and storefronts.
their distant windows
flare white light
metonymy
for those inside them.
orbs, wavering
they glow with
want,
and misery
and parties and days
and nights and
faces.
they glow,
whispering their
familiarity of
distant things.
I reach out,
grasping inanely,
for any of it
all of it
at once.
and like sand,
I let it sift through.
become my glimpse,
my smiling passerby.
A memory to be forgotten-
it shares a brief dance
with the wind, twirling,
silently lost in itself
for just
a few
breathless
moments.
before becoming truly lost
in everything else
beautiful that is
left behind.
  Mar 2019 L B
Donall Dempsey
WHAT IS NOT THERE...THAT'S THERE.


She saw music
written upon the air.

"I see..?" I said.
Not really...seeing.

"Oh like birds
perched on telegraph wires

becoming a musical score
in themselves?"

She shook her head
as if trying to clear it

of my words
not understanding her.

"No! Not as obvious as that!"
she snapped.

I stood corrected.
She raised her finger like a batton.

"But with...mordents and accents
clefs. hold and thrills!"

I tried to help her along
with her explanation.

"Like notation you mean
key signatures and such!"

"I see them in 3-D
and in colour!"

I could only smile
unable to keep up with her.

"I have only to pluck them
out of the air

set them singing
within my being.!"

I looked at the sky
it did not sing to me.

It spoke only of clouds
becoming other than they were

of weather
that was to be.

She hummed the sky
softly to her self.

I wish I could hear
with her eyes.
"An hallucination is a strictly sensational form of consciousness , as good and true a sensation, as if there were a real object there. The object happens to be not there, that is all."

Ceri only attained this ability when she survived the motorbike accident that killed her boyfriend. When she awoke a week later this"seeing music" was as natural as breathing to her.


Principals of Psychology

William James
L B Mar 2019
My bright and shiny little girl
with dark smiling eyes and yellow curls
who learned to talk before she walked
Who lifts sorrow
like an offering to joy
who waits
and gives and gives-- and gives again
to everyone whose path she's crossed

It didn't matter
Yes, it did...
Those bride's maid dresses
never fit
Made for tiny friends and frames of dreams
a day to hang a life on...
For others always
She made their days
She spent herself
Not telling tears
of sausage dress
she could never wear
"What were they thinking?"
"Maid of honor" she became
--in name only
She stands aside of honor by design

Awaiting honor to grace her
in its own time
The name Phoebe means bright and shiny one.  She is the tiny child in the poem, "Yellow Waking Mother."  

Did I say that I adore her?
Yesterday, her love gave her the ring
Birds and angels in the heavens are not enough...
today, to sing!
L B Mar 2019
March roared and rained and ripped
itself from winter
a wounded lion

Last seen following the snowbirds
Juncos leaving for the arctic this week
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