Dedication

To the millions

who transplanted to a new land,

may you each reclaim a core self

Contents

Cover

Title Page

Dedication

Part I: Again!

Rolling-Shoe Party

Loudest Quiet

Elation and Guilt

Alarmed Dragonflies

Must Above Want

AAAAHHHHH!

Who Would?

Don’t Worry

Three Against One

Chick and Doll

On My Side

Belly Heart Mind

Asian Expert

Two to Two

Saigon Seeds

Chased-Loud-Fun

Yellow, Orange, Red

Two to Three

Best Sisters

Unsaid

Pack

Half This, Half That

Secret Age

Cloudless Breezy Ease

Ocean Churn

Part II: Tết-sát-xì

Melt Into Air

Baby Leaf

Gears Inside a Watch

Blank Hours

Reclaim Mother

Pop-up Stories

Hisses

Refugee Luck

Rumbling Rectangle

TiTi and I

Gears Sputter

Does Not Stink

Sappy Day

Without Mother

Numb

My Unsaid

Vu Lee Lullaby

Rebound

Trading Tales

GGGOOOOLLLL

Summer

Longest Six Hours

Perfect Math

Cool Breeze, Cucumber Water

Cotton-Ball Tickle

Absorb/Ignore

Five-O Pelé

Day at the Râu-đi-ô

Twenty-One Days

Cocoon of Comfort

Pro-pa-gate

Bubble Nursery

Daring Fate

Pig Per Month

Top 40 Ride

Pink Silk of Yellow Flowers

In My Pocket

Feathery Rain

Gold, Thin, Stretchy

Bus Buddy

The Wait

Red Rose

Buy Back Grin

Pretense

Loop, Swirl

Inside Outside History

Many More

Self, Family, Society, Earth

Mimic

Nerves

Breaths

One

Tiny Stabbings

The Only One

Piggy Poop

Part III: Our Anchor

Flip-Flopping Weather

In Father’s Palm

Kumquat and Licorice

Smooth Tangy

Roly-Polies

Leaf Skeleton

Lashes

Judged

Not Tết

S Revolt

Happiness All Year

Secure Luck

Futures

Our Cloud

Brother Quang’s Turn

Bare Gourmet

Almost All Dings

Saturday Night Fever

Patch-Part Patio

Gain, Relinquish

Author’s Note

About the Author

Books by Thanhhà Lại

Copyright

About the Publisher

Part I

Again!

Rolling-Shoe Party

First refugee year

I didn’t know to ask

for a day-of-birth party.

Last year Mother reminded us

all Vietnamese gain an age

together at Tết.

Our flip of the lunar calendar

was celebrated back home

as if combining Christmas,

western New Year’s,

Thanksgiving, July 4th,

plus millions of days of birth.

This year

Pam and I, April babies,

will invite twenty friends

to a rolling-shoe party

like Amy’s last autumn.

I vow fewer

purple quail eggs

on my swollen knees

while Pam plots around

her religion’s no-music rule.

Pam insists on April 10th,

my day, not hers,

to mark my first party.

So like her.

We were each

a maple seed,

spinning unclaimed

until we rooted

as best friends.

March 10

Loudest Quiet

My throat is fluffed

to relay party news

but incense commands

a hush.

On the altar sits

our one portrait of Father,

his forever young eyes

behind smokey coils.

I wouldn’t have forgotten

his missing-in-action date

if we remembered him aloud.

Allow the story to quiet,

Mother has murmured

as she struggles to accept

not ever knowing.

Within myself

“how when where”

boil in constant bubbles.

I bet my brothers

ache the same.

Father’s fate is

the loudest quiet

in our lives.

March 10

Night

Elation and Guilt

Brother Quang drives

Mother and me

to Kmart to buy

more bandages.

Mother’s fingers

still can’t dodge

snapping-turtle bites

from an electric

sewing needle.

I again wander

toward gym shoes,

which classmates have

but not me.

Light as mist,

ocean green,

white flashes,

crinkly paper

stuffed inside.

A yearning rips

through my bones

into marrow,

driven as

Mother’s vow

to ensure our future,

Brother Quang’s quest

for a scholarship,

Vu Lee’s obsession

with Bruce Lee,

Brother Khôi’s focus

on breeding fighting fish.

I return the shoes

as if settling eggs,

then clomp away in

brown heavy leftovers

from churchgoers.

Brother Quang

retrieves the pair.

Mother’s lips twitch

between

scolding and smiling,

We have not bought

the week’s necessities.

Brother Quang

calculates food

we will do without.

My lips twitch

between

elation and guilt.

March 12

Alarmed Dragonflies

Phone screams.

Must be Vu Lee’s

Sunday collect call

from San Fran-cis-co

where his idol’s feet

once floated.

Mother reaches

for the voice of

her middle son,

glimpsed only through

sketches he sends

of short-tall buildings,

up-down streets,

of himself fly kicking,

steaming crab legs.

It’s not Vu Lee.

A paper,

a pencil,

a phone number.

Mundane items

mismatching

Mother’s excitement

alarm dragonflies

lolling in my gut.

March 13