Moon in Khmer

You are light

when the sun is punched out

and darkness reigns.

You are the antidote

to what came before:

black blood, black heart,

hands tied, kneeling before

a ditch of human bones.

Your laughter pierces

the silence of night

that bore witness

to the once blood-soaked land.

Your existence is resistance

to the genocide that orphaned

your father and drove

his family out of the homeland.

You are love against

the hate of the Khmer Rouge.

This is the meaning

of your name, Chanda.

This is how to defeat Pol Pot.