All the Broken Pieces Read online

  For my brothers,

  Joseph & Michael

  Contents

  Title Page

  Dedication

  My name is Matt Pin

  In the day

  That night

  It’s great being part

  Tryouts start

  On Wednesday

  The assignment is

  The piano sits

  Something’s going on

  Partner up and start throwing

  On Wednesday

  Coach Robeson starts

  On Saturday, my parents

  Veteran Voices, or VV

  No one asks me any questions

  Saturday is cold

  Tuesday just before the final bell

  Thursday night

  Coach Robeson isn’t at practice

  Across the street

  Until they find a full-time

  On Thursday night

  On Wednesday afternoon

  On Tuesday afternoon

  On Wednesday

  When I see Rob

  We win our division

  I can’t believe how easy

  I’ve been thinking

  On Sunday, it rains

  The days are getting

  Acknowledgments

  After Words™

  About the Author

  Q&A with Ann E. Burg

  A Brief History of the Vietnam War

  Make Your Own Mooncakes and Paper Lanterns

  Step Up to the Plate

  Write a Poem

  Copyright

  My name is Matt Pin

  and her name, I remember,

  is Phang My.

  His name

  I will never say,

  though forever I carry his blood

  in my blood,

  forever his bones

  stretch in my bones.

  To me,

  he is nothing.

  If he stumbled on me now,

  I wonder,

  would he see himself in my eyes?

  And I?

  Would I recognize the dragon

  who went beyond the mountain

  and never came back?

  I carry her too,

  her blood in my blood,

  her bones in my bones.

  Eyes I will not forget,

  though I see them

  only in dreams,

  in fog,

  through thick clouds of smoke.

  I hear her voice,

  thin, shrill staccato notes,

  her words short puffs of air

  that push me along,

  inch by inch, breath by breath.

  In choking mist

  and wailing dust,

  through sounds

  of whirring helicopters

  and open prayers,

  I hear her.

  You cannot stay here,

  she says.

  Here you will be like dust.

  Bui Doi.

  Dust of life.

  You cannot stay here.

  I remember little,

  but I remember.

  There were babies crying

  and mothers screaming,

  begging soldiers to take

  their children.

  Take her, take him.

  Please let them live!

  Pushing, praying, pleading.

  I would rather be dust

  on the road

  than leave her.

  But it is not enough.

  She pushes me forward,

  through screaming madness

  and choking dust,

  through fear and fog,

  through smoke and death,

  through whirring sounds

  of helicopter prayers,

  and night falling like

  rain-soaked stars.

  Survive,

  she says.

  Remember

  not this shame.

  My father says

  when I am older,

  there are places I can go

  to find him,

  but I won’t.

  What good would it do?

  He never saw my face.

  But she was already swelled

  with love for him when he left,

  taking with him

  his blue-eyed promise

  that it would not end there,

  with the smell of burnt flesh

  and the sound of crying children.

  I will come back,

  you said,

  and she believed you.

  Why not?

  You shared her home,

  she called you husband,

  why should she not believe you?

  But you did not come back.

  What is there left to say?

  Why should I find you?

  The house I live in now

  is big,

  but its walls are thin.

  At night, when they

  think I am asleep,

  I hear the news on TV.

  I hear them talk.

  It’s no wonder

  the soldiers are broken,

  Dad says.

  When they left, they were

  high school heroes,

  stars of the football team,

  with pretty girlfriends.

  Now look at them—

  hobbling on crutches,

  rolling themselves

  in wheelchairs,

  while people throw things—

  tomatoes,

  rotten apples,

  angry words.

  I have a now brother.

  He doesn’t look like me.

  I’m too much fall—

  wet brown leaves

  under a darkening sky.

  Tommy is summer—

  sunlight, peaches,

  wide, grinning sky.

  Even Tommy’s hair is summer.

  Curls cling to his scalp like

  the yellow-and-white sweet corn

  at McGreavy’s Market.

  Only one straight tuft sticks up,

  like a clump of sun-scorched hay.

  I have another brother.

  Dark skin, dark eyes,

  straight black hair,

  and a laugh like a

  babbling, bubbling,

  quickly tumbling

  brook.

  She would not let him come.

  If we got separated,

  he might not survive.

  Who would want a little boy

  mangled and deformed,

  she said,

  with missing fingers

  and stumps instead of legs?

  Who would want a little boy

  like that?

  I would, I begged.

  But no, she said.

  You are strong, she said.

  You go.

  When you are grown,

  if you still remember,

  you can come back.

  How can I go back?

  Where would I look?

  What would I say?

  If I remember.

  How can I forget?

  My now mother

  is small like me.

  Her hair is long

  and yellow.

  She fills my room

  with the smell

  of summer.

  When I wake

  in the middle of the night

  full of screams

  and flashes,

  she sits on the edge

  of my bed,

  her pale hands move

  gently across my face.

  Her voice is soft,

  like warm honey.

  She sings a quiet song.

  There is darkness on the water.

 
There is darkness on the land.

  There is darkness all around us,

  but I will hold your hand.

  You are safe, my precious child.

  You are safe now, you are home.

  We have found you and we love you.

  You will never be alone.

  There are no mines here,

  no flames, no screams,

  no sounds of helicopters

  or shouting guns.

  I am safe.

  How can I

  be home?

  My father

  has chestnut-colored eyes

  and short brown hair

  that is starting

  to wear away in front.

  His well-scrubbed hands

  are square and strong.

  Every Saturday afternoon,

  if it is not too cold

  or rainy,

  we go to the park.

  My father and I

  toss a ball.

  I catch it

  in my oversized glove.

  Again and again,

  he pitches,

  I catch.

  I pitch,

  he catches.

  Back and forth,

  back and forth,

  until dusk creeps in

  and the ball

  is just a swiftly

  moving shadow

  fading into darkness.

  Every time at the park,

  I remember the first time.

  What is this place? I thought.

  I was small.

  Small, but not young.

  I was almost ten,

  but I looked much younger

  than the other boys my age.

  There were two boys

  on a swing

  and a little girl

  bouncing

  on a pink elephant

  with gray spots.

  There was a painted

  ladybug seesaw,

  a shiny slide,

  and monkey bars.

  Even now,

  sometimes

  I cannot believe it.

  I cannot believe

  so different a place.

  A place made

  just for children.

  I think about him.

  I wonder where he is.

  He would like it here.

  Tommy is too young

  to play ball.

  When he comes

  to the park,

  we put him

  on the swing.

  Higher, he says,

  and I pull him

  back as far

  as I can reach

  and then let go.

  Higher, he says,

  laughing.

  His small fists

  squeeze the chain.

  His perfect toes

  dangle

  inside

  bright red sneakers.

  In school

  for Veterans Day

  we write essays

  on freedom.

  I write,

  Freedom is the color

  of bright red sneakers.

  What is this? the teacher asks.

  Does this make sense?

  The first two years,

  I went back to the

  adoption agency

  every Saturday morning

  to learn English.

  Once a month,

  my mother and father

  came with me.

  We spent

  the day reading

  legends and fairy tales,

  how Au Co was

  a beautiful mountain fairy

  who married

  Lac Long Quan,

  a daring dragon prince.

  We celebrated Tet

  and Tet Trung Thu.

  We ate banh giay

  and played danh phet.

  We did not talk about

  the American War,

  how tanks lumbered

  in the roads

  like drunken elephants,

  and bombs fell

  from the sky

  like dead crows.

  For two years,

  I learned about Vietnam,

  but it wasn’t any

  Vietnam I remembered.

  The teacher

  was a tiny woman

  with small eyes

  who always stayed

  in one spot

  when she talked,

  but whose words rolled

  up and down,

  up and down

  the classroom walls

  like a glass marble.

  She told happy stories

  of people and places

  I did not know.

  Colorful costumes

  and carnival dragons

  live in another Vietnam,

  a Vietnam

  that I do not remember.

  I close my eyes.

  I listen.

  I try to remember

  the colors,

  but I cannot.

  I try to form

  dragons from

  dust,

  but I cannot.

  I try again.

  But I cannot.

  My Vietnam

  is drenched

  in smoke and fog.

  It has no parks

  or playgrounds,

  no classrooms

  or teachers.

  It is not

  on any map

  or in any book.

  My Vietnam is

  only

  a pocketful

  of broken pieces

  I carry

  inside me.

  The children in that class

  look at me strangely.

  My lashes are not flat

  and straight like theirs.

  Their hair is not thick

  and brown like mine.

  We are all children

  born in Vietnam.

  Most of us

  have two names.

  A new name

  to welcome us,

  and an old name

  to remind us.

  Still, I am different.

  My face

  is part American.

  But anyway,

  twice a year

  we get together.

  We celebrate

  Tet or Tet Trung Thu.

  These customs

  are strange to me,

  but still

  my stomach aches

  with sadness.

  I want to go back.

  The agency classroom

  is decorated with

  red and gold streamers.

  There are fresh fruits,

  flowers, and sticky

  little rice cakes

  on the teacher’s desk.

  Are you all right?

  my mother asks.

  She feels my forehead.

  She touches my face.

  She compliments my

  paper dragon and my

  folded lantern.

  I shrug.

  I’m just not hungry.

  I give her my dragon

  and my lantern.

  Here, these are for you.

  Maybe he’s getting too

  old for all this,

  my father says.

  He needs to experience

  his culture,

  my mother answers.

  At night,

  when I try to sleep,

  I hear her cry.

  Music is soothing.

  My mother’s words

  float through

  the thin walls.

  Maybe music will help

  soothe his monsters.

  Let him play baseball,

  my father answers.

  He has a good arm.

  I turn out the light

  and keep listening,

  but it’s quiet now,

  darkness on the water,

  darkness on the land.

  In
the day,

  Jeff Harding works at

  the same hospital

  as my father.

  At night,

  he teaches piano.

  Jeff was supposed

  to go to a school

  for music,

  a special school

  in New York City.

  Instead,

  he went to Vietnam.

  He rode the

  helicopter ambulances

  that rescued

  the wounded.

  He took care of them,

  right there

  on the helicopter.

  Maybe one day

  Jeff can show you

  his Dustoff patch,

  Dad says

  Saturday during breakfast.

  But I know he won’t.

  Jeff’s Vietnam

  is my Vietnam,

  the Vietnam nobody talks about

  on Saturday mornings.

  On Wednesdays,

  an hour

  before dinner,

  I sit at the piano.

  My fingers stretch

  across the keys

  like a soundless

  spider.

  Jeff stands

  beside the bench

  as I play.

  He crosses his arms

  and smiles.

  You can hit the keys a

  little harder, he says.

  Let’s look at the notations.

  He points to the fancy S.

  That’s the treble clef.

  Each line and space is lettered

  so we’ll know what note to play.

  Let’s learn the lines first.

  Here’s a way to remember them.

  He puts his foot up

  on the bench

  and taps each line

  with a pencil.

  Every good boy deserves fudge.

  He smiles and

  taps them again.

  Every good boy does fine.

  The next day,

  after school,

  I practice piano

  for half an hour.

  Some kids complain

  about practicing piano,

  but not me.

  Notes are like numbers,

  never changing.

  Staccato or sustained,

  pounded or tapped,

  notes always stay

  the same.

  Ten divided by two

  will always be five.