Interview

BILL MOYERS: Tell me about Sandy Scull, a lieutenant in Vietnam in ’67 and ’68.

MAXINE HONG KINGSTON: Yes, a poet before he went. I guess he must have been like me, you know, a poet since childhood. And then, when he went— the poetry stopped and he could not write poems for 30 years.

BILL MOYERS: After he came home?

MAXINE HONG KINGSTON: After he came home. There were no poems. He had a block for 30 years. And I think the way he would put it was that he lost his spirit and he lost his imagination and I want to read you the poem that he wrote.

MAXINE HONG KINGSTON: It’s called Sea Salt.

BILL MOYERS: Oh yes, yes.

MAXINE HONG KINGSTON: And the whole poem is about the way of coming home. You know, he had post-traumatic stress disorder, which means that the body goes numb, the appetite is gone, he’s alienated from, from his fellow citizens.

Sea Salt

After the Vietnam War, I withdrew
to Nantucket: “faraway isle.”
Hoping to glimpse the boy
before spirit fled the body.
Thirty-three miles of ocean exiling me
from a homeland offering little embrace.

Me and my dog, Christopher. Christ-love
disguised as loyal canine. We combed beaches.
Working for the island newspaper connected me.
Tides soothed with ebb and flow.
A rhythm I could trust. Even eat by.
I fish the last three hours of the east tide.
Buried my toes in the sand, searching
for the texture of littleneck clam.

When water was warm, I sailed out solo.
Stripped then slid into the sound.
Looking up toward the surface light.
Christopher’s gaze wavering with wind
and water between us. Breath bubbles
rose, bursting under his nose.

My body now embraced,
a ritual purification in salt.
Dismembered dreams floated closer.
Something dissolved in a solution
that held me. Breathing easier,
I could imagine again.