Writing a long poem, I unexpectedly met a character

People often call this kind of trip "field trip", but I don't think so. I just keep going, secretly hoping that I will meet something, a tree, a person, a rocky plateau, or a sudden thought that pops up in my head. After trips to Ha Giang with Mr. Tuan, a Kinh cadre who has become a local, he loves and understands the Mong people very much, when I returned to Quang Ngai, I saw the image of a... cloud. It was "The cloud shaped like a hunter and a dog". I was very happy, because I knew that this seemed to be the title of the poem I would write about the Mong people. And I started to write a few hundred verses. It can be said that this is the first epic poem by a Kinh poet about the Mong people. Then, I unexpectedly met a person, a young Mong man. I met him in... Thanh Nien Newspaper. That was Mr. Vu Gia Po, a Mong man who was either lured or naturally wandered to China. And was captured and enslaved.

"sometimes

Vu Gia Po is me

from Meo Vac

don't fly

walked more than 7,000 km across the Himalayas to the state of Azad Kashmir (Pakistan)".

Vu Gia Po crossed the distance from Meo Vac, Ha Giang province, to Pakistan, about 7000km long - (Photo: Amiruddin - Thanh Nien )

According to a report by Thanh Nien Newspaper, Vu Gia Po, a resident of Meo Vac area in Ha Giang province, Vietnam, was reported missing two years ago. However, he is currently being held by Pakistani authorities after months of investigation, and there is not much information about the reason and how he wandered more than 5,800 km (later determined to be more than 7,000 km) across the Himalayas to the state of Azad Kashmir (Pakistan).

"I don't know

why can i go

as if someone was calling my name

Vu Gia Po

a parrot

often eat corn on Meo Vac fields

fly with me

7,000 km

in the night over high waterfalls and steep passes

barefoot

surf through many ethnic nations

parrot talking to me

as if we were born to be friends"

( Vu Gia Po was arrested for illegally crossing the border )

Thanh Nien newspaper recounted that: When he saw the image of the Vietnamese flag and money on the screen, "He was very excited and happy. He said something and made a sign to say that these things were mine."

"'Vietnam is mine!' Vu Gia Po

'I am of Vietnam!' please don't ask

where do i come from

Vu Gia Po is a real person, not something I imagined. Only the parrot is a "character" I added. And the story of Po traveling 7,000 km is also a true story, even though no one believes it, a Mong person was captured and hid in China, hungry and thirsty, ate whatever he could find, and just kept walking, passing through many countries, many races, from China, crossing many high and steep passes, dense forests, deep rivers. The path he traveled is as shown on the map.

Why do Mong people walk so unconsciously?

After reading this strange report in Thanh Nien Newspaper, Vu Gia Po immediately became my character. It seemed like a coincidence. Poetry still appears in a seemingly coincidental way. I completed the epic poem The Cloud in the Shape of a Hunter and a Dog in just a few months. I thought, I should send this manuscript to a writer who is really close to the Mong people to ask for his opinion. Uncle To Hoai had passed away, now, only Nguyen Ngoc remained. I immediately sent the first unedited manuscript to Nguyen Ngoc, asking him to read it and give his opinion. While Nguyen Ngoc was reading, I continued to edit and sent him the edited version. Unexpectedly, writer Nguyen Ngoc was very inspired when reading the manuscript. He immediately agreed to write me an introduction. I finished writing this epic poem quite quickly, but Nguyen Ngoc wrote an introduction even faster. It was so fun. It can be considered that this is the first time I have met the Mong people, written a long poem about the Mong people, and completed it, in my opinion, so well.

Cover of the epic poem The Hunter and the Dog Cloud

When writing the introduction, Mr. Nguyen Ngoc sent me some passages from the famous ethnologist Savina's work that he had read and recorded 10 years ago. Writer Nguyen Ngoc wrote:

"I don't have FM Savina's History of the Mong People in my hand at the moment, but I still have some notes on my computer when I read this book ten years ago. I quickly translated those pages and sent them to Thanh Thao. He called me and said he had read it right away, and was very interested in what Savina wrote, and even more interested because it seemed that the famous ethnologist had said exactly what he had imagined about the Mong people when he picked up the pen. But then he said: "It's fortunate that you translated and let me read Savina after I had written the epic. If I had read it before, I probably wouldn't have been able to write. Because writing after knowing all of that, it turns out that I would only be illustrating ideas that already existed. Literature is not about illustrating with words what I already know with reason. I can only write as passionately as I have written when I still believe that everything I spread on that page is my own creation, that I "fabricate" a completely new reality to add to this life!…".

So that is what is called literature reflecting reality. With all his passionate love, the writer "guesses" about the strange things in life that surprise him and make him try to understand and explain them. When he has real talent, what he guesses can coincide, or rather, be much more real than the truth. So here there are two strange things, both very beautiful: the strangeness of Vu Gia Po unconsciously traveling across the Asian continent to find his deep roots; and the strangeness of the poet Thanh Thao, also unconsciously, artistically unconsciously, discovering the wonderful truth that the erudite scientist Savina found about the Mong people through the rigorous path of scientific reason. So beautiful, both.

I am someone who has written many epic poems, and I feel very clearly that, with the epic poems I like, the element of luck is always a very important component that makes the work "smoothly written".

On the occasion of the 22nd Vietnam Poetry Day "Harmony of the Country", I would like to share a few sincere words.

Source link: https://thanhnien.vn/viet-mot-truong-ca-toi-bat-ngo-gap-mot-nhan-vat-185240223090054174.htm