Back in 'Nam

I chose to do the poem "Camouflaging the Chimera" by Yusef Komunyakaa. I chose to do this poem because from the first line "We tied branches to our helmets." I already understood it was a war zone and by "from Saigon to Bangkok," I knew it was Vietnam. I googled who Yusef was and found out he did serve in the Vietnam War. His imagery and message were clear by the fourth stanza out of nine. 

When thinking of the Vietnam War, it is popular opinion to think of the tall grass and wet lands. Vietnam is a tropical climate and in movies like Forrest Gump and Across the Universe, you see that there are deep rivers with tropical plants resembling palm tress and bamboo. We also remember that we were not welcomed in Vietnam not only by the Vietnamese, but by Americans themselves because we didn't want to be there. So in the sixties, we think of the peace/hippie movement where there were protests of the war and for peace. 

Yusef uses these popular ideas and morals in the imagery of his poem. He gives examples of the soldiers camouflaging themselves ad their weapons with "mud from a riverbank". The place is set up with the details of the branches being tied to helmets, the riverbank being used for disguise, blades of grass in their clothing, the presence of bamboo, and the breeze off the river. Then, one can argue the desire of not wanting to be in Vietnam the line "We wove/ourselves into the terrain,/content to be a hummingbird’s target." The soldiers were okay with being a target. They infiltrated the land and were fine with being someone's target. When you weave yourself into a certain place and after are okay with being someone's target, it has implications that the location a person is in is causing the "content" with being somethings target.

     To me, Yusef was the most successful in creating imagery because within three stanzas without saying the exact setting, he was able to tell me that the place of the poem was Vietnam in the sixties. The first line in the fourth stanza that mentioned Saigon and Bangkok was just a confirmation of my thoughts.