For long, long years, he exiled himself in silent seclusion, and deliberately cut himself off from the world. No, he did not sell his house and move to the mountains far away from civilization. But it was close because the desert that lived in his soul, the vapidity that gnawed at his mind, and the emptiness that filled his heart were real to him. Nothing could induce him to leave the bleak ivory tower of his voluntary but poignant solitude. There was no one out there, he thought, who mattered to him. And there was no one out there who could fire up his imagination, liberate his poetry, and set his romantic soul on fire. Did he ever dream of an Erato, who would appear from nowhere and by sheer force of personality or beauty awaken his desire to feel again, and express his emotions in poetry? Perhaps he had given up hope and faith for the heart shrivels for lack of nurture and tender feelings.

Then one day, as if by Providence or by serendipity, a radiant woman came to his dream. An extraordinary person had stepped into his barren, loveless world. Gently and tenderly she covered him with the subtle mantle of her charms, and woke him up from his long self-imposed sleep. He opened his eyes and found out too late what had happened. Was it a dream, or was it real? Her eyes and smile assured him that it had been a dream no more. She had arrived, to stay.

He pinched himself to make sure he had not lost sanity or consciousness. For the real world could very well play tricks on anyone's perceptions, especially when the dream he had nurtured in his heart for so long had come true all of a sudden. He had found his Muse breaking out of the mist of his longing to give him renewed energy and life. He was, not so much in a metaphorical as in a very real sense, revived from the death of oblivion and the dark of despair.

You and Me marvelously captures the romance and psychology of the man and his newfound love in the epiphany of mutual discovery.

At long last he had found exactly what had been missing in his life. A woman with grace, dignity, charm, passion, beauty and intellect who communicates so easily and spontaneously with him. He knew instinctively that they were made for each other. And she knew it too. Why did it have to take so long for their paths to cross? This, like so many other questions in life, is an unanswerable question. But now it really did not matter that much. He was content to let unanswerable questions stay the way they are for no one needs to answer all questions to live a meaningful life.

It is enough for him to sense that she was now his, for himself only. She had been hiding all his life, only to appear at her own pleasure, and at her own timing. She brought fulfillment to his yearning, beauty to his verses, music to his ears, and delight to his soul. What a miracle that she existed at all, for a human being as endowed as she was just did not seem to be in the realm of possibility.

For her he now writes poetry. He now sings of her beauty, of the music of her voice, of the grace of her being, and of the charm of her eyes. And he extols her attributes during the day and at night when the stars scintillate in the mysterious sky above.

His verses weave strands of love in the morning dew. He casts them across the world to cover all the grasses and the trees with the fragrance of tender feelings. He sings his verses in the gathering dusk too for the love that has begun to take roots is so delicate and crystal-pure that it needs to be raised by voices of adulation at the mood-setting sundown.

She opens in him the gate of passion and releases the energy of his feelings. She gives him a world of creative vitality for him to reign as master. For she knows this is the reason she has come in the first place. She has come to give him voice, and knows that once freed from his shackles he will soar to the stars on his passion and love for her.

She knows this because the butterflies that flit about and the flowers that smile whisper in his ears the eternal message of love. They gently tell him to keep loving and to keep the excitement and the passion he feels alive for they are as real as life and love are real.

As I read So'ng Viê.t's poem, I was struck by her uncanny ability to stir the reader's heart with her insight, her empathy, and her simple yet highly evocative language. At times it is hard for me to distinguish between her poem from one I wish I could have written under the circumstances that she depicted.

It is this artistic sensibility and unerring perceptiveness that endear her to her readers.

And if you gentlemen have a romantic penchant let me warn you: without the protection of your clinical detachment and a prosaic approach, You and Me might just lead you to believe that So'ng Viê.t-Dam Giang is really talking about you and your sweetheart.