Cam Ly

“Sweet citrus”; that's what they called you,
your parents when you were born,
smiling up at them from a makeshift crib;
a cloth-and-lavender stems type of
bed pushed to the far wall of their room
under a witch-cut circle window.
Girl, you came into this world; an autumn-eyed
child with a perfect bow-mouth and
as you grew older, your blue-black hair draped down your spine,
almost reaching your waist-line.
But the neighbors; your father's friends, were never satisfied.
They told him, “She's pretty enough, sure..
But she's still just a worthless female, sir.”
Then they'd pat his arm as if to say,
“We're sorry for your loss”,  even though;
your dad was never disappointed, at all.

That's right; he'd carry you on his shoulders
through town on each festival day.
He'd buy your sweet iced Taro, even though
the sugar would make your milk-teeth hurt
and your mother would scold him afterward.
“Don't spoil her!” Ma would say.
“Or else, she'll grow up thinking she's a princess;
raised in a jade palace with golden
chrysanthemums and ladies-in-waiting,
feeding her cherries, braiding her hair.
If you dote on her too much, she'll be disappointed
when the fairy tale ends; when she wakes up
from this snow-castle dream and finds out we don't
really live like monarchs but peasants, instead.”
Oh your mother meant well, girl,
but your father never listened to her.
Shaking his head, he merely asked,
“Why shouldn't she believe in angels out there;
because to me, she's a gem..”

Oh and it was with this same free-spirit
mentality that your dear Ba introduced us
one Monday morning in the schoolyard.
“This is my daughter,” he said when
he spotted me skipping rope under a tall Taiwania tree.
“Please play with her; she's too shy to ask out loud.”
And sure enough; when I glanced over,
your cheeks flushed red.
But as soon as your dad left, girl;
you showed me that we had underestimated you.
We dubbed meek too soon because
you jumped rope better than I did.
Oh sweet Cam, your movements were swifter;
your limbs reached higher, legs longer
than mine, arms more slender, hands
almost touching the leaves that threatened
to fall from all those skinny branches.

I might have been jealous in the back of my mind;
wanting to be just as cool but
at the moment, I was in awe.
Oh you laughed when the bell rang
but not in a mean way.
You said, “All that jumping has
made me thirsty, how about you?”
Then we raced to the water fountain
before the teacher could tell us to get in line
with the other children.

And years later, we're still that way;
sharing one bike, riding through the rain.
My hands around your tiny waist,
pearls of spring in my hair; evidence of
thunderstorms reflected prettily
in your long braids and we're still
the odd couple nobody suspects is
shaking up their once-predictable worlds
of temple gatherings; conservative
clothes and lists of orderly birthdays.
Oh yes, sweet Cam; we're shaking up
their society with our own brand of
heroine diaries; music from the addictive
metropolis that is Tokyo, fame from Hanoi.
Yes, we're teenagers; we dance around in our bedrooms,
listening to secret tracks on the radio,
hoarding pirate-films from the west.
We're teenagers still; we think we're smart
but the truth is, we don't quite know what love is yet..
No, we don't know what to do with
these promise-rings we slipped on each others' fingers
when we were eight, now that we've outgrown
their faux-sparkle; now that the bands have tightened
around our skin, stretching the veins that
once made us innocent, made us worth
the trouble of dowries, candy-money.

Oh but you'll always be special to me..
Even if our strange but fun encounters
don't last forever; even if someday
I'll have to move away, try my luck in the city and
eventually put away all those high school year-books,
you'll still be a sweet orange blossom memory.
And I guess you'll always be the one that got away..

So swift, so strange and electric like power-line
flash-storms; March-April-May madness,
silk dresses all wet and wrinkled, everything about
this moment is dream-spun, yet real.
And nobody can tell me you're not mine to hold when
it feels so right, as close
to perfect as I'll ever get.

With your cheek pressed in the crook of my neck and
shoulder, your eyes closed; lashes brushing my skin,
sweet  Cam, I promise this moment is better
than any fairy tale I'll ever read, will ever need.

So melt my February lies; if you wish, society-in-pink.
You with all those paper-hearts and sugar-drop notions
of what makes a happy Christian or Confucian marriage
last; I never needed your strict orders,
your home-spun tea offering, to feel human.
All I needed; oh high-priests, was the safety and
closeness that this Lao Cai girl gave me,
without asking for anything in return.
And you can swallow that truth like
snakebite poison, if you want..

I remember so clearly; the day my secret slipped
out of my locker in school, how
I was taunted afterward for keeping a love-letter;
written, signed by another girl.
The bullies; they called me crazy,
they called me a tramp, white-trash with a giant
L stamped on my forehead.
“Lesbian”; but why is that a bad thing, I wondered..

And humiliation of that sort; second-grade harassment,
dug its yellow claws deep into my bones;
the mechanical workings of my heart back then,
but now, I say, “To hell with normalcy;
conformity in a black-and-white telly.
No, I'm not ashamed anymore.
I'll never apologize for wanting
to be treasured by another girl.”

Oh sweet Cam Ly, your kiss; thrilling and strange,
raw like the inside of jack-fruit,
coral like a seashell that refuses to be washed
away, hidden in the sand;
your summer-fresh kiss broke down my barriers.
And even if this relationship
we've managed to keep intact
through the darkest of years;
nights praying to some deity to make us “straight”
before bedtime, even if it doesn't last forever,
I have to thank you because in your own quiet;
lark-lady way, you set me free.