Yusef Komunyakaa. Dien Cai Dau. 1988.

Understand that I am the sort of person who prefers Vietnam war poetry over jazz poetry, that I like a book of poems to hang together as an album rather than as a collection of singles, then accept that I find this book to be one of the most haunting collections of poetry I know of, and certainly the best book about the Vietnam War I have yet read. Not knowing the jargon is not a problem, it is almost better to learn the military terminology through the poetry. The titles reveal what the poem is about in a flash, then the poems burn slow releasing colored smoke and aromatic vapors, sparkling. Aside from a few poems written with two-or-three line stanzas, there is little in the way of noticeable poetic structure. The last lines tend to invoke chills, and then sometimes you turn the page and discover that the poem continues. It is all just terribly beautiful writing about a nightmare that could not be forgotten.