The Peace Sculpture Wore
In the end,
the last birds
will be mockingbirds.
R.B.
June 11, 1963.
On a busy South Vietnamese
street, a Buddhist monk
sat like charcoal in flames
smoke, palms together in
protest of religious persecution,
as bystanders watched.
Did you know his myth—Kathleen?
How his heart found whole
was placed in a shrine?
How The New York Times would
run your story? Soon enough
find you more or less insane?
Local reports cite
anonymous police sources saying…
evidence was found
that Ms. Kathleen Chang
experimented with cuts
of meat and flammable
liquids—for the past year.
It was the picture of you
in a bathing suit
that first stopped me.
Fifteen years of waving protest flags,
of dancing stars & stripes bikini,
of yelling social transformation
manifesto on the grounds of Penn U.
She became a fixture there some said,
not attracting the crowds she once did.
Your sad eyes seemed to watch me
as I read—you danced as I read
strutted and kicked—perhaps calling
me sexist, perhaps not.
Why October 22nd of ’96?
Why Tuesday? Why choose
11:20 a.m. to walk across campus,
stand before sculptured peace
sign between two trees, pour
bucket of gasoline over your slim
build, and set yourself aflame?
…Ms. Kathleen Chang
experimented with cuts of meat
and flammable liquids…
In a letter she gave out
to local media and friends:
This is the tactically
correct move. I feel it with all
the weight of my soul.
Fifty witnesses watched,
as a lone university policeman
tried to smother the flames with his jacket,
but the flames started up again.
Sweet Kathleen, some said
you tried to dance.
By late afternoon
as light rain fell,
the peace sculpture wore
more than a dozen bouquets,
strands of beads,
and a poem that began:
Maybe she was crazy,
the girl said,
but I don’t think so.
The last birds are
here, Kathleen.
The last birds
are here.
Andrés Castro
