Ah my red child where did you go?

You vanished so quickly I did not know

you at all, at first.

Perhaps you were scared by the glint of the bayonets

or just the unintelligible language they spoke

or the pain they brought with them.

 

Ah my red child where are you now?

The creatures have gone away

It has been two long years but

the demons have gone away.

They have taken their knives and guns

and my soul away.

 

…

 

Ah my red child is that you I see?

My eyes are weak, this body aged

Some sixty years since you left

[That girl in her spring

that spring she remembers

all too well, her body remembers it too]

 

The red child kisses me and

I am well again:

pure as the rain that falls and

cleanses the earth

young as the rising sun

remembering gentleness, smiles

and kind words.

It was all a bad dream, wasn’t it?

 

The red child laughs, and holds my hand.

Your world grows dark

yet mine sings her song

of the peace and joy of all things gone.

 

Note: This poem was inspired by learning about the experiences of the many Korean, Southeast Asian, Chinese and other women forced into sexual slavery in the Pacific War by the Japanese military. Known euphemistically as “comfort women,” ianfu or chongsindae, these women serviced up to thirty men a day and were subjected not only to sexual violence, but disease and other forms of horrific physical abuse. Up till this day their government gives them only cursory recognition.