A short story in Vietnamese by Nguyễn Văn Thiện
Translator: Nguyễn Thị Phương Trâm
Art: Đinh Trường Chinh

ACCIDENTS

Accidentally, I spilled my wine, instantly a stable of galloping horses leapt out in neighs and onomatopoeic thunder. Accidentally, I broke the moon, immediately from the cracks in the moon, butterflies with human faces gloriously bloomed. Accidentally, I caught a flame; instantly it exploded into stars of vast multitudes. All these incidents had morphed into streams of shiny tears. And you will never know, they might just meet each other on a day not far, the staple of horses meeting the stars, the stars meeting those butterflies, the butterflies may find at the apex the wind whirl mist.

Tonight the sky over Mount Chư Mang is bursting with the wind, no snow but the heavens is a fog of blinding love and longing. Butterflies dreaming of…