Napalm Girl

The sky fell shortly after lunch time.
The ground shook
as a city of soot and smoke
constructed itself before our eyes.
As the camera crew and I rushed
to the edge of the town of Trang Bang,
it became clear what had happened.
Two South Vietnamese Skyraider aircrafts
roared through the charcoal sky
like leaders of a parade.
We all just stood there,
holding our breath,
waiting for the assembly line of napalm victims
to blaze towards us.

Minutes passed horribly.
We weren’t sure if the faint howls ringing in our ears
were coming from the horizon
or from our own heads. Then
the dark clouds perched on the dusty road
sprouted faces.
Screams were everywhere:
on their foreheads,
on our clothes,
on the dismembered limbs
the townspeople held like bouquets.

My heart
rose out of my throat and slammed its fist over my trigger finger,
snapping shot after shot.
These people bear proof of the horrors of the Vietnam War.
The world should not turn a blind eye to this!
I thought, wondering
if the ash collecting on my lips
was from soil or human flesh.
(Screams in our mouths.)

Then, she appeared in my viewfinder:
a girl, about 8 or 9 years old,
naked after tearing off her scorching clothes.
She was screaming,
running towards me,
her arms spread at 45 degree angles from her body
like a wounded, featherless bird;
a horizon-sweeping wall of black smoke
billowing behind her.

After taking the photo,
I put down my camera,
rushed her to the hospital,
pushed us to the front of the line.
She survived
because of me.

By the time I returned to the United States,
the photo had already been seen by millions.
It won the Pulitzer Prize for Photography that year,
for spreading awareness of the cruelties of war to the world.

Time passed.
Back in Vietnam, Kim was taken advantage of by the government,
used as a propaganda symbol for the masses,
pulled out of college, from continents away,
to be a symbol of the victimization of their country.

 To this day, 40 years later,
she is still referred to as “The Napalm Girl.”
I saved her life,
yet transformed her into a martyr.
The worst day of her life is frozen in time
forever
because of me.
She lives it over and over
because she survived.

Still,
she affectionately calls me “Uncle Nick,”
recognizes the historical significance of the image.
My camera was put in a museum.
Her life was put in a museum.
There is more than one kind of casualty.
She learned this better than anyone.