the last page of the calendar | Hứa Hiếu

Saigon book street, Vietnam. Photography: Nguyễn Thị Phương Trâm

A poem in Vietnamese by Hứa Hiếu
Translator: Nguyễn Thị Phương Trâm

541.
____________
after a game of hide and seek
the birds shift their tired wings returned to the dark side of the mountain
I’m scrambling
to pick up the pieces of lost time
scrubbing them, hang them up, to after folding them neatly inside a draw called life
there, they quietly lay
a tumulus
I’m the same
the last page of the calendar
.
December 2020
_____

khi xong trò trốn tìm
lũ chim rủ nhau nghiêng cánh mỏi về sau bóng núi
tôi lụi cụi
gom tháng năm lưu lạc
giặt giũ, rồi xếp ngăn nắp vào tủ cuộc đời
ở đó, chúng nằm im
một huyệt mộ
tôi cũng thế
một tờ lịch cuối năm.
____________
Hứa Hiếu


Hứa Hiếu, the poet from Vung Tau, Vietnam, currently living in Lawrenceville, United States.

Nguyễn Thị Phương Trâm, the blogger, poet, and translator, was born in 1971 in Phu Nhuan, Saigon, Vietnam. The pharmacist currently lives and works in Western Sydney, Australia.

Nguyễn Thị Phương Trâm's avatar

By Nguyễn Thị Phương Trâm

There's magic in translating a body of work from one language to another.

Leave a comment