|
Leong Nok Tha Where's Your Chastity Now? A collection of poems exploring aspects of war By Willy Bach © 1989 - 1999 WORDS ON WAR "In order to save the village we had to destroy it" Unknown American Marine "If you grab 'em by the balls, their hearts and minds will follow" "Give us your hearts and minds or we'll burn down your goddam village"… "I'm glad the CIA is immoral" Thomas W Braden, one time head of the CIA's Division of International Organisation "I can only say that we have been conducting propaganda as defined by F.M. Cornford: That branch of the art of lying which consists in very nearly deceiving your friends without quite deceiving your enemies." 11th June 1964 Rostow Chairman of the Policy Planning Staff "… any SEATO contribution. Martin said 'keep them doing what they are: UK building a field near Savannakhet; Australia has aircraft at Ubon. Felt that troops into Mekong towns (inside Laos) will not all be US (but UK and Australia feel that their ground forces are tied up in Borneo; might provide air)". Summary Record of Meeting 1 Honolulu 2nd June 1964 "I greatly value the close consultation our two governments* have had and the parallel actions we have been taking". Lyndon B Johnson President of United States - telegram to British Prime Minister 22nd May 1964 * refers to Britain and United States From declassified US State Department documents "At present nothing is possible except to extend the area of sanity little by little" George Orwell "1984" "Perhaps this is the mission statement for this book" Willy Bach - Author DEDICATION This anthology is dedicated to the end of military conflict and all who struggle to achieve this. Non-violent resolution is entirely possible and practicable. It is also dedicated to those who suffered, the innocents who got in the way when conflict occurred. To those who live in the nightmare of post traumatic stress …… this is for you as well. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I wish to acknowledge the invaluable assistance I have received in assembling this anthology. Friends Marit Hegge - Internet Tim Collins - Advice Lk Anh Tuan - Inspiration, Background Phuong Le Duc - Inspiration Mrs Ounkham - Background Jeff Usher - Compositions, Accompanist, Collaborator "A Stone in the Pond" Raine & John - Whose fathers were involved with the CIA Senator John Woodley: Research Questions, Private Members Bill Lisa - Word Processing 1991 Poems Kristen - word processing 1998-99 Organisations MAI West End, Sister Lurlene English (deceased) Quoi Migrant Resource Centre, West End Queensland Poets (extinct) Queensland Writers Centre Research Facilities State Library, Queensland Brisbane City Council Library Griffith University Library Performance Venues Metro Arts, Brisbane - 'Tour de Force' own show 1991 Café Lunar (extinct) Queensland Performing Arts Centre - 'Out of the Box' own show 1992 Story Bridge Hotel Maleny Folk Festival Writers at the Rails, Byron Bay Warana Writers' Festival 1991 and 1993 Wordfest 1991, 1992 Literary Journals/Publications The Cane Toad Times Skarfe Northern Perspective Southern Review Southerly Small Times Small Packages New England Review Social Alternatives Wordsworth Idiom 23 Redoubt The Australian Writers Journal Micropress OZ API News The Green Left Weekly Radio Stations ABC RN, 4QR, 4RPH, 4ZZZ, FM101 Passion 99.5 Arts Radio, Singapore With special thanks to 4MBS FM Classic Radio With special thanks also to Mike Ladd, Poetica, ABC RN INTRODUCTION How would you feel if you did not believe in killing people and had a background that related strongly to the Holocaust of World War II? How would you feel if you discovered that, by the simple act of wielding an edging trowel, you had unwittingly participated in another of the twentieth century's holocausts - the CIA's Secret War in Laos? Willy Bach's response was to write poetry - very angry, passionate lines that should make us all stop and consider the full implications of war. He almost lost his sanity, ended a twenty-three year marriage, revisited the scene of the crime and took ten years to complete this work. ABOUT THE AUTHOR Willy Bach was sent to North-East Thailand as a British soldier with 11 Independent Field Squadron, Royal Engineers in March 1966. He worked on a construction site for two months. There was also an Australian Troop of around thirty men in the unit. The work being carried out by day and night was the building of an airstrip two kilometres long in 'pavement quality' concrete. The official story was that the airstrip was for the Thai Government to develop the local economy by enabling the peasants to market their produce more effectively. The transport Caribous that would allegedly use the airstrip were capable of landing on the asphalt taxi-ways and could have used even less sophisticated surfaces. That was when he was twenty. Twenty-two years passed. Suddenly, he felt that something had been boring away at his soul and had remained hidden all that time. Something very wrong had happened at Leong Nok Tha. It was possible that the airstrip had been intended to assist in the secret bombing of Laos or Cambodia by the CIA undercover airforce - Air America. These forces were operating from Ubon Ratchathani and other bases alongside 'official' forces and was made up of retired US Airforce personnel and highly paid mercenaries, Air America, 'free agents' out of control. They dealt with the drug barons of the Golden Triangle, in weapons and drugs dealing in death and making fortunes for themselves. For a period of eight years Laos was the most heavily bombed country in the world, until the citizens of the USA found out what their own Government had been doing. The legacy of unexploded bombs, millions of aerially-seeded anti-personnel mines and damage to people and productive resources continue to this day. CONTENTS Sarong The First Ballad of Leong Nok Tha The Second Ballad of Leong Nok Tha The Third Ballad of Leong Nok Tha Nothing Matters Anymore Finished Being Angry Lunch at Schloss Eberstein 1962 The Ballad of Bukit Asahan NoneedtoKnock, Special Relations Empty Magazine Wardrones A Prisoner in My Conscience Not a Single Drop - Prose Pathetic Figures in the Forest Candles in Ann Street Top Copter Brother Number One - Father of the Year Long Before There Was Charlie Air Cadets Solid Citizens Skirmish House TVRI Berita Pagi Ci Ci Fly That Suitcase Packaged I II III IV Rolf My Father Ashes Poste Restante Unnamed (on the Road From Ubon Ratchathani to Leong Nok Tha) I II III Bad Medicine Rediscovering Kok Tha Lat - Prose This Is Not My Village Boy soldiers Hmong They Tell Me Baby Airforce I Did It My Way River of the Disappeared Site Two is My Country Venerable Lunch Bangkok '93 O Vacuum Us and Them Negotiations Niketick Lou Wardarlings Unresolved McNamara Has Spoken Warmemory Angelfire.com Kosovo Rewind This month's poems: TVRI BERITA PAGI I am sitting in a peaceful room In a garden of jambu And bilimbing Three kinds of coconut TVRI is with us In full colour Bringing us the world As they see it Berita Pagi presented In sophisticated style By model women All about what the men Are doing In their uniforms With their guns Bosnia Herzogovena In full colour Mogadishu in ruins We are so lucky In Kuta with so many Men with guns To protect their rule From quiet folk with sarongs And stick brooms Pounding their chillies Washing rice Grating coconut Marinating their tempeh And Xanana Gusmao Not far from here Captive Footnote: This poem was written in Kuta, Bali in 1992. It has been published in several literary journals. THIS IS NOT MY VILLAGE As I come To tread your dust Walking as though fixated Returning as though a hero On my pilgrimage of peace Memories and anguish I tell them in my mind This is yours Left hardly better than before I have no sense of place This is not my village Just because it all looks familiar Just because the children All run into the street Group themselves for photographs Give me their address Let it be yours Let me give it back With my shattered conscience This is not my village These are not my people Lost in dust Just because this old man Can talk my language A little ......and yes He remembers Kevin From Sydney not known to me And next month Those who came after Will return - perhaps to gloat Slap one another On the back This is not my village For up this dusty track Young women came To feed on wasted semen And be forgotten Now all the beer bottles Mamasans and bars Are gone This place is where it was Before - long ago I came This could never be my village This is not my village This is not where my Placenta is buried Not where the spirits Of my ancestors dwell The right to own this land Was never granted me I should neither bring Nor take Soldiers are tourists with guns Tourists are invaders with cameras This is not my village This could never be mine These are not my people Though I am their brother Nothing could give me the right To remove them To another place To extinguish their houses From the face of the earth To set them wandering In search of roots that cannot be A new village cannot be their village New land has no ancestors This is not my village Dedicated to the villagers of Ban Kok Talat where the airstrip was built, ten kilometres from Leong Nok Tha, revisited in January, 1993. This poem has been published in several literary journals. THEY TELL ME BABY AIRFORCE I come to taste the air Feel the firm concrete Under my feet Confirmation That I was not dreaming I had not imagined this I had not thrown away Everything I had Planned for five years Broken ties Spoken out Shared my pain Came all this way Not knowing what I would find No drug No rush of joy No orgasm Could feel like this I want to cry out Pressure welling up In my lumped throat I want to sing My long repressed song Painful exhilaration That mountain I remember Standing here Trowel in hand Dreaming the mysteries Of that mountain In Laos This rude finger Grey and cruel Pointed in her direction I came to see the ground At ground level The people as they were Foraging Their diminished realm For herbs and frogs And twigs Buffalo strolling Across this useless blot Two kilometres Of pavement quality Concrete Two kilometres For what Two kilometres Built for jets Aimed to kill I ask I ask the magic question I know the answers I know the questions What is the question? Who came here After me? They tell me Everything I want To know Americans Yes! People many countries They tell me Baby Airforce I know the questions I know the answers Baby Airforce Baby Airforce They tell me Baby Airforce Footnote: Baby Airforce was one of the nicknames given to Air America, the CIA's secret airborne wing. Baby Airforce was a term used in the film 'Air America". SITE TWO IS MY COUNTRY She who cannot hear Cannot speak She Thai She OK She with me Stands hot Confused So what? If I could read your lips If I could hear You say Me poor too Me too poor Life too hard Cost too much Only work Like prison Like this Why you come Why you look Why you talk talk They Kmer They different What difference They run Come here How come Why come No welcome This country My country Why come here No come here No good here He Kmer Speak English Show camp Ride bicycle Cost money Show family Tell story Bad story Sad story Lose family Run away Run here Come here No good here No hope here No power here No free here This country Your country He come here No hope here Stay twelve year No good here Have daughters Four daughters All prisoners No see country Never see country Never been country Where is my country Site 2 is my country I have no country Site 2 is my country I have no country Site 2 is my country I forget country Site 2 is my country Footnote: In February 1993 I visited Site 2, the notorious, Kmer Rouge controlled, Cambodian refugee camp near That Praya, Aranyaprathet, South East Thailand. I was accompanied by a deaf and dumb Thai woman, Kwajeen. I arrived at the camp with no papers from Bangkok but still persuaded the guards that I was an English teacher. I was allowed to see the camp, though forbidden to take photographs. At that time the United Nations were rapidly repatriating the camp inhabitants to Cambodia. Only a tenth of the original 350,000 refugees remained. At the camp gate we met Phoung Savuth and another man on bicycles. I paid them to show us the camp. The story was that of Phoung Savuth and all Cambodians. The poem is dedicated to Phoung Savuth and his family who suffered so much and so needlessly. On 7 July 1995 Phoung Savuth wrote to say that he had been repatriated to Cambodia in February of that year, two years after my visit. The title of the poem is taken from his words. It has also been published. Poems changed on a monthly basis. Publishers welcome e-mail laoswarpoet@hotmail.com |
 |
 |
 |
