Born in Los Angeles and raised on both sides of the U.S.-Mexico border, Gina Valdés (b. 1943) has taught Spanish and creative writing at Colorado College and various campuses of the University of California and is the author of two bilingual poetry collections, Comiendo lumbre (Eating Fire) (1986) and Puentes y fronteras (Bridges and Borders) (1996). Her poem “Hearts on Fire”—first published in George Mariscal’s Aztlán and Viet Nam: Chicano and Chicana Experiences of the War (1999)—explores what she calls the “interrelatedness between all beings,” the lives of its speaker, her young friend, and many beyond them, all linked in joy and in pain.
1968,
the year you were born
in Saigon to a Vietnamese dancer
and an American soldier
you have never met, Ngoc,
some hearts broke
into chants, others
into flames.
Our voices circled your city, your birth,
students chanting to Ho Chi Minh.
Thich Nhat Hanh intoned the Heart Sutra,
Brother Martin prayed with him, was silenced,
César and Dolores recited the red earth mantra.
Cousin Popo’s prayers exploded
in a mine, next to a Vietnamese boy,
a nearby rice field,
and grief.
Monks and nuns
opened their lotus hearts
and caught fire.