Diana Khoi Nguyen In Solidarity With Artsakh
National Book Award finalist Diana Khoi Nguyen is the latest poet in our series of writers supporting the people of Artsakh as they are forced to flee their homeland, where Armenians have lived for over 2,000 years. [This video was recorded on September 20. 2023.]
“Hi, my name is Diana Khoi Nguyen, and I stand with solidarity with Armenian people as they face this current atrocity. The Lachin corridor must be reopened for humanitarian aid. As I follow the ongoing horror, I find myself turning to this poem by Adrienne Rich, which I’ll share it right now.” [Adrienne Rich, “What Kind of Times are These” from Collected Poems: 1950-2012. Copyright © 2016 by The Adrienne Rich Literary Trust.]
There’s a place between two stands of trees where the grass grows uphill
and the old revolutionary road breaks off into shadows
near a meeting-house abandoned by the persecuted
who disappeared into those shadows.
I’ve walked there picking mushrooms at the edge of dread, but don’t be fooled
this isn’t a Russian poem, this is not somewhere else but here,
our country moving closer to its own truth and dread,
its own ways of making people disappear.
I won’t tell you where the place is, the dark mesh of the woods
meeting the unmarked strip of light—
ghost-ridden crossroads, leafmold paradise:
I know already who wants to buy it, sell it, make it disappear.
And I won’t tell you where it is, so why do I tell you
anything? Because you still listen, because in times like these
to have you listen at all, it’s necessary
to talk about trees.