Speak, Okinawa by Elizabeth Miki Brina

Author:Elizabeth Miki Brina [Brina, Elizabeth Miki]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Published: 2021-02-23T00:00:00+00:00

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My father never talked about the war. Not the fighting and killing and death. Not the terror and panic and confusion. Not the remorse and regret.

But he loved to talk about jumping out of airplanes, and how the mountains glowed purple in the moonlight. He loved to talk about wading through sludge and tying himself to a tree so he could sleep without slipping into the water and drowning. He loved to talk about the time he shined a flashlight on a spider the size of his head hanging from a tree inches from his face, and how he jumped backward and upward so high he did a backflip and a belly flop, and how he and his buddies laughed, squeezing their mouths shut tight with their hands, not wanting any Viet Cong to hear, all of them crying and shaking together from laughter. He loved to talk about the time he earned a buffalo nickel, a prized token of bravery, by dropping the coin into a full bottle of Cognac, lighting the rim on fire, chugging the whole bottle, catching the coin between his teeth with his last gulp, then standing on a stool while ringing a bell and shouting, “Truth and courage!” He loved to talk about the friendship and solidarity, the special bond that is forged. He loved to talk about strategies, leading attacks and defenses, about his relevance and importance.

But now, as he gets older, after several glasses of bourbon, more and more of the war leaks out of him. He talks about running for his life through dark thickets of jungle, through black swamps, throwing grenades to clear escape routes, the guts of snakes splattering, as the Viet Cong unloaded rounds of gunfire. He talks about positioning a man on his side or facedown so that the blood drains to the ground rather than floods to his lungs after his throat is slit, so that the man bleeds without choking on his blood, which is more merciful. He talks about uniforms and medals of men who died, men who were killed, uniforms and medals given to him to give to their families. When my father remembers and mentions the names of lives that were lost, names of lives he couldn’t save, his eyes water, and tears stream down his cheeks. These are the only times I have seen my father cry. Not when he dislocated his knee. Not when his foot swelled from gout. Not when his stores went out of business. Not when he got fired from his jobs. Not when his father died. Not when his mother died. Only these times.

My father tells me about ghosts.

He tells me about guarding his camp, lying on his stomach in a trench and falling asleep, and how he heard the voice of his friend, a friend who had just died, had just been killed. His friend yelled, “Brina, look out!” My father woke up and looked out, in the direction of the voice of his friend, just as a bullet whizzed past him, grazing his left ear.

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