A Love Poem For Hue Poem by Thanh-Thanh NhuanLe

Back to Hué!The green leaves on the dreamy way
suddenly seemed to set the sun in my soul to sway;
since that early in the morning a certain bird
has made various vague tunes in my heart heard.

You came home.Steps resound in the small alley,
light smoke skim along in the Imperial Citadel pally.
Though stony, I become so surprisingly upset
as the once I wondered if I had lost my self yet.

The River of Perfumes gets nostalgic in fall;
Its fog and flowers make your sad air enthrall;
that stream of youth's hair is source of eternal love;
you still are always a kind of naive dreamlike dove.

Over the eyes of that Hué morose ancient shrine
I, the nomad, to brush with a kiss did once incline;
the Sacred Lady's dodder caught my affection to fill
like a light evening breeze on the Huong Tra Hill.

You have got home, and I aged with so long to miss,
Oh Royal Capital, coaches and horses of old bliss!
I feel I reel with send-off spirits on the parting plate:
Is this the only bitter remainder of my thus bitter fate?