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VIETNAMESE POETRY ___________
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DINH CUONG ________________ YEAR-END BLUES Translated by NGUYEN NGOC BICH The same cello playing somewhere, very near year-end evening, on 18th Street with a small cup of wine, at Toulouse-Lautrec missing you. Six years - of loss loosing friends but gaining others and quiet flows the Potomac at tidal height, in a glory of bursting flowers I find myself walking on the edge of a December dry forest the winding path emptied of people in the afternoon as accustomed I drop by a secondhand bookstore still see the ancient rimes of Jacques Prevert who lived in dream "out there the winter "your lips a point of fire" Shon, out there is the sea in late night no sandcrabs are there to be seen Qui Nhon, Qui Nhon and the Princess... her slow, deliberate speech, echoing a sea of memory now transformed into froth in my beer So I remain alone, wandering at this year-end
Translated by NGUYEN NGOC BICH ( SongVan Magazine, issue 11)
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