The Kind Young Man with the Shy Smile

Jen Ashburn

-After Yona Harvey

 

WOMEN    America          much power      says
               in                 have                     he

driving his van               over         red-clay roads
                       carefully         the                         of  Laos

 

             have            power        
Woman           much             

his uncle                 in Hawaii
                 who lives                told him

 

                           IF     man
                                a 

hits                 the police         come
        his wife                    will                            Woman            

have
                           power

 

The van driver                     to drive these roads
                      whom I paid                                              

has
         a wife

                  a pregnant wife        a four-year-old
                                           and                           daughter

 

He      nice       me                    the men              are nice     me
      is          to                      All               in  Laos              to

 

He drives carefully       talks            rice
                            and          about         harvesting        

         with his                     
                         family
            

He waits patiently            I take photos 
                           while                         and think

     this           who        his wife?
Is         a man        hits         

 

He waits patiently            I take                   Pia Vat temple
                            while             photos of

 

                                    destroyed     1968
which we (Americans)                    in          except

 

                        Buddha                    statue charred black
for a stubborn                 a resilient

 

               ask                   wife
I cannot         about his

 

Why don’t        marry              over noodles                      
                  you           he asks                                                

 

In Laos                         alone                           
            you cannot live                   he says               In Laos

 

                           family                 
                                             is                  
                                                      everything.


Jen Ashburn recently completed her MFA at Chatham University in poetry and creative nonfiction. She has work published or forthcoming in Grey Sparrow; Pretty Owl Poetry; Anak Sastra; The Poet’s Billow; Puff Puff Prose, Poetry and a Play Vol. II; and the anthology Make Mine Words (Trinity University Press). She lives in Pittsburgh.