Dien Cai Dau

by Yusef Komunyakaa

Book Overview

Poetry that precisely conjures images of the war in Vietnam by an award-winning author.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0819511641
• ISBN13: 9780819511645
• Release Date: September 1988
• Publisher: Wesleyan University Press
• Length: 72 Pages
• Weight: 3.25 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.3" x 5.4" x 7.9"

Customer Reviews

Komunyakaa's imagery brings to life the Vietnam War

Yusef Komunyakaa is the kind of poet that wins people over with his honesty. I agree with Adam from Mercer Island when he says that "This is powerful poetry, so much that when I read it I feel like I'm there, watching him and the surroundings that he witnessed in his mind so well." The most impressive aspect of Komunyakaa's poetry is his ability to create realistic visual images within the mind of the reader. The poet does, as Adam from Mercer Island mentioned, make the reader feel as if they are a part of the moment. The connection created allows the reader to fully understand the depth of meaning in each poem. There are several poems within Dien Cai Dau that accurately depict this concept. The poem "A Greenness Taller Than Gods" is an excellent example of Komunyakaa's use of imagery. The poem begins with, "When we stop,/a green snake starts again/through deep branches./Spiders mend webs we marched into./Monkeys jabber in flame trees,/" (1-5) It is evident from the opening lines that Komunyakaa has a talent for creating visual images. It is like the reader is there with his platoon marching through the jungle and taking orders from the point man. In each of his poems, Komunyakaa also shows the fragile side of the soldiers. In "A Greenness Taller Than Gods", the speaker conveys this fragility by voicing the fears of the soldier. Lines 9-12 state, "The lieutenant puts on sunglasses/ & points to an X circled/on his map. When will we learn/to move like trees moves?". The soldier struggles to move like trees knowing full well that it is not possible to do so. The reader gets the idea that the soldiers attempted to do many things that verged on impossible, which causes the reader to sympathize with their situation. Another poem that causes the reader to sympathize with the speaker of the poem is "You and I are Disappearing". In "You and I are Disappearing", the poet is describing a scene that most people would never want to see in their lifetime. The opening lines state, "The cry I bring down from the hills/belongs to a girl still burning/inside my head. At daybreak/she burns like a piece of paper." (1-4). The visual image created here is vivid, although disturbing. The poet goes on to use several similes to further describe the state of the burning girl. The picture that is painted in the mind of the reader is graphic and forces the reader to understand what the soldiers of Vietnam had to witness and take part in. The poem is a successful attempt at portraying the depravity of the Vietnam War. Along with Adam from Mercer Island, I too enjoyed the poem "Thanks". This poem creates some very realistic visual images and makes the reader think long and hard about luck and fate. The speaker of the poem is a soldier who is thanking whomever was responsible for him living through the war. Although I agree with Adam from Mercer Island in that the poem is touching, I do not see how it would be heartbreaking. I believe that the over

"Dien Cai Dau"- prominent Vietnam War writing

The poetic memoirs of Yusef Komunyakaa in the book "Dien Cai Dau" are based upon the poet's various experiences overseas during the Vietnam War. "Dien Cai Dau" is a superb collection of wartime poetry. Yusef Komunyakaa is a Pulitzer Prize winning author who served in the Vietnam War as a correspondent and editor for a newspaper. The aesthetic imagery Komunyakaa uses within his collection of Vietnam War poetry wonderfully captures the explosive scenery and experiences gathered throughout his time spent over there during combat. This is a collection of Vietnam War time poetry well worth reading. During one of the more impressive poems within the collection, "Somewhere Near Phu Bai," Komunyakaa and the speaker expresses his nighttime duty of watching the placement of the claymore mines. The claymore mines were being monitored because the enemy was known to rotate the grass floor bombs around, so upon engagement, they would blast onto the opposite forces instead of the enemy's. The poem begins with the line "The moon cuts through night trees like circular saw white hot" (1). The ominous image of the white moon cutting through the dark sky like a saw corresponds with the jagged, gloomy evening. The image of a moon is repeated throughout the poem as the speaker/man on duty describes "The white-painted backs of the Claymore mines like quarter moons." (14,15,16). Through repetition of the imagery Komunyakaa engrains the shadowy image of the night moon, and the fatal image of the bombs being shaped like moons as well. This is an effective correlation, because readers associate the night with the moonlike mines as does the speaker whose orders are to observe the mines. The claymore mines become his night. Comparisons and correlations like this occur throughout the collected poems allowing the audience to experience along with the speaker each wartime event. This is one of the wonderful attributes within Komunyakaa's writing because he really invites the reader to engage himself or her within the book. Many of Komunyakaa's poems within his war poetry collection depict circumstances in which he remembers events during the war, and the recollections of these events reflect his emotions gathered during these experiences. Through the speaker's emotional stance, the book is successful in gathering an emotional response from the reader. The poet's ability to gather such emotional contact and responses from the reader constructs a memorable literary work. One brilliant poem within the book, "Roll Call," achieves the idea of gathering an emotional response from the audience. The poem describes a day in which a platoon of troops honors those that were killed during combat. The bodies are missing so the living war buddies are "lined up for reveille, ready to roll-call each M-16 propped upright between a pair of jungle boots, a helmet on its barrel as if it were a man" (4,5,6,7,8,9). The image of the surviving men "burying" their dead invites an

Never held a gun in my life

This is powerful poetry, so much that when I read it I feel like I'm there, watching him and the surroundings that he witnessed in his mind so well.Some of his metaphors are almost magical in their quality, their effusiveness, and ability to draw you in. It's also helped by the fact that very few poets write about war like this. Sure, there've been the I Rhyme, You Die poets from the civil war or other periods of history, but nothing like this.He talks about the soldier's main preoccupation: women, home, warm smiles, grenades, RPG's, and dying--of course. All the while you know that there's this inherent sadness he can't talk about while he's a soldier. That's what makes these poems run so deep. I especially liked the poem "Thanks". It was heartbreaking for me.It's beautiful reading about these scars, sad as they may be. Being a Soldier is a tough man's job, and hopefully people will read this book of poems and realize that.

Incredible Images, Wonderful Words

I read this book of poems for the first time in a literary analysis class in college. I hadn't really enjoyed or understood poetry up to that point and certainly didn't imagine it would be something that I would want to focus my studies on. This collection blew me away. I ended up doing my honors thesis on Vietnam War Poetry, using this book as a standard by which I judged others. Most war poetry is very boring because it represents a heroic look back in attempt to glorify war. This book is nothing like that it is an incredible adventure into the realities of war and its effects on the psyche. I HIGHLY RECOMMEND THIS BOOK AND ANYTHING ELSE BY KOMUNYAKAA. He is an incredible poet. I would also highly recommend the works of BRUCE WEIGL. I wrote of his work in my thesis as well. They are both incredible writers.

an emotional depiction of vietnam.

When I was nam I never really examined much of my emotions consciencly. It was not until I got back, where I realized the scares it had left. Thank you for showing me your scars.