Best Laos Poems

The monks gave me a bag of Thai oranges
Before I left for the States.

Next time I come, I’ll have learned more Lao,
I promise.

  ...

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Looked up and down, right and left
Wondering why life suffers a theft
Subtracted beauty from my chin cleft
 
If I deserved and preserved the best
My love...

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A stretch and sprawl of plain and hill
Where stones survive the coldest clouds,

You’re jars and trails and scars
Rebuilding your shattered face 
One hammered bullet at...

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The pro-Hanoi Vietcong many years ago
In the 1950's Diem's government they'd overthrow
All opposition was crushed killed or jailed
These elected ones to their people they failed

This...

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When I am in your home,
I am back to Laos after a lifetime.
I am in a place beyond words:

      ...

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I meet you in Laos
as a seed
just a simple
existence of hard rice
seeded inside Huay Xai’s dirt
until water plains
cradle and nourish your infant body
'till you sprout...

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Pistols shoot
and rifles unload
thunderous banters
initiate the race
she dives
into the Mekong River
stealth head start
she leads amongst the pack
of four boys and three girls
paddles faster than catfish

other...

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a ghost haunts the country of Laos
sieving through jungles
crackling twigs because
it has not yet died
beware of it
the one who drags one foot
while the other rots...

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MEMORIAL DAY 
June 1, 2015

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

To all of you that have ever worn
"THE UNIFORM"
The Uniform of safety and security,
 The Uniform of pride and liberty
THE UNIFORM...

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We think them plentiful, like jumping shrimp and tiny crabs:
These mak hung, these chilies, the base for padaek.
The mouth waters with even a mention.

Every heart...

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Not long ago yet an epoch away
 I lurched upright 
Morpheus interrupted by
Mid night soul fuel running on
 Vapors
Long since evaporated in the 
Still born...

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Youa tells me a story over the hot hibachi:
How she went to Laos
To see her lucky sisters

For the first time in two decades,
Since the country...

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  AIR FORCE


There were those times
On long missions over Laos and the Gulf of Tonkin
When a weariness settled over us
Over pilot and navigator and...

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I like a global currency
I hate to convert money
In Laos
Wars are fought and lost
Over paper money
That is worth nothing
When are they making money
Out of rice
So...

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supporting the anti-communists in 
the Soviet Union from
1944 to 1989---
supporting al-Za’im in Syria in
1949---
installing Shah Mohammed Reza 
Pahlevi in 1953 Iran---
supporting Colonel Carlos Castillo 
Armas...

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