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Mother

by Vuong PhamPrescribed for HSC English 2024–2027 (NESA) · Last reviewed Mother is a free-verse poem by Vietnamese-Australian poet Vuong Pham, in which a son plucks his mother's grey hairs while she recalls the life she left behind in war-torn Vietnam.

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Summary

Mother is a free-verse poem by Vietnamese-Australian poet Vuong Pham, in which a son plucks his mother's grey hairs while she recalls the life she left behind in war-torn Vietnam. For the HSC, it is studied in Module A: Language, Identity and Culture as part of the Contemporary Asian Australian Poets anthology.

Overview

In this poem, Pham utilises a free-verse structure to reflect on the sacrifices made by his mother to give her young family the best opportunities for success after fleeing war-torn Vietnam. The poem's 'narrative' is driven and framed by the persona's symbolic act of plucking his mother's grey hairs. Her grey hairs represent her age, and he removes them in tandem with her recollection of experiences from her youth. He sees how this act 'transports' her mind back in time and removes the burdens of her trauma.

The 'narrative' begins with the persona asking his mother what her passions and interests were as a child, to which she replies that she wanted to be a teacher. This prompts Pham to remember how, when as a child at school he brought home a certificate 'of improved literacy,' his mother was proud.

His mother's words prompt the persona to then imagine what her childhood in Vietnam must have been like. He describes the sights and sounds she would have been familiar with, before remembering that that world no longer exists. Indeed, the violent memory of Vietnam contrasts with the peacefulness of their conversation, 'on the living room carpet we sit' in order to remind us of the horrific circumstances the mother escaped, and the world of hope and peace she arrived at: 'a paradise / one unbound by war and exodus.'

Despite highlighting the benefits of a life in Australia, the poet nonetheless recognises the hardship his mother endured as a migrant: he speaks of how she worked long hours so that he could avoid a life that was 'confined / to the labours of factories.'

The poem concludes with a vivid and emotional reconstruction of the day the mother, pregnant with her son the poet, left her 'homeland,' and began her journey to Australia. In doing so, Pham again emphasises the contrast between the despair of Vietnam and the hope promised by Australia, but also stresses how traumatic it nonetheless still is to leave one's ancestral and cultural home forever.

Context

Vuong Pham is a Vietnamese-Australian poet who grew up in Brisbane, the son of refugees who fled Vietnam after the war. His mother was pregnant with him when she left, so the journey the poem reconstructs is also the story of his own arrival in Australia. Mother appears in Contemporary Asian Australian Poets (2013), an anthology that brings together writers of Asian heritage writing about identity, migration and belonging in Australia. The fall of Saigon in 1975 prompted a mass exodus from Vietnam, and hundreds of thousands of people made dangerous boat journeys to seek asylum; Vietnamese migration reshaped Australian society in the decades that followed. Pham's poem sits within this history but approaches it domestically, through a quiet conversation between mother and son on the living room carpet. For Module A, the poem offers a study of how language and storytelling carry cultural identity across generations and between an ancestral homeland and an adopted country.

Cultural Assumptions

Turbulence of Assimilation

Pham's poem affirms the often-traumatic process of assimilation, and that while although it can indeed lead to a better life, it still unavoidably harms those individuals who undertake it. For Pham's mother, assimilation was made necessary by the war in Vietnam: she was uprooted from her life and had to escape in dramatic fashion. With that physical departure, her connection to her ancestral and cultural heritage was strained, but not entirely severed.

The Power of Nostalgia and Memory

It is by storytelling, and recounting past experiences, that Pham somewhat mends his and his mother's connection to their shared ancestral and cultural heritage. Most immediately, he forms a more complete understanding of who his mother is as a person by hearing of her life in Vietnam before the war.

Quote Table

  • “using a sewing machine for less than $5 an hour / to afford rice, pork, Asian vegetables / and help pay for my tuition”

    Technique
    Accumulation
    Idea
    Cultural heritage, Value of language/education

  • “I picture her driving a yellow scooter … the soothing aromas of pho and lychee tea… crescendo of rickshaws”

    Technique
    Visual, Aural and Olfactory imagery
    Idea
    Cultural heritage, Loss of home

  • “Mother, this week I taught my students Wordsworth / saw thousands of daffodils and thought of you.”

    Technique
    Intertextuality, Literary allusion, Visual Imagery
    Idea
    Power of language, Assimilation, Cultural heritage

  • “praying that I may speak an unbroken English tongue / and never be confined / to the labours of factories”

    Technique
    Religious imagery, Visual imagery
    Idea
    Cultural heritage, Assimilation, Language

  • “I know now, as I did in my childhood wonder”

    Technique
    Refrain, High modality language, Juxtaposition
    Idea
    Impact of time

  • “that my mother dreamed of a paradise / one unbound by war and exodus.”

    Technique
    Religious imagery
    Idea
    Cultural heritage

More Contemporary Asian Australian poetry

Contemporary Asian Australian Poets - Visual Aid

Visual aidContemporary Asian Australian Poets
Poems
Themes
  • The Turbulent Process and Equally Disorienting Consequences of Assimilation
  • The Power of Nostalgia, Memory and Storytelling to Form a More Complete Sense of Self
  • The Cosmopolitanism of Multiculturalism
Context
  • White Australia Policy
  • Racism
  • Influx of Asian immigrants to Australia in the mid-1970s
  • The repeal of the White Australia Policy gave way to increased interest in making Australia a more multicultural nation, and emigration to Australia by foreigners was heavily advocated for by the government and businesses.
Quotes: Nostalgia, Memory and Storytelling and their Ability to Shape Identity
  • "Eyes, lips, hands conjoined: the umbilical cord restored." Final stanza of "This is where it begins". Metaphor, cumulation
  • "And as I do jigsaw-puzzle pieces of memory lock together, my past made whole." The fourth stanza of "Mother" whereby the persona is attempting to understand his mother's past, metaphor
  • "It was a little strange, / as if from a world I hadn't inhabited but had heard stories about" The second stanza of "Translucent Jade" where the persona considers and questions their connection to their culture. simile

Frequently Asked Questions

Which module is Mother by Vuong Pham studied in for the HSC?
Mother is studied in HSC English Module A: Language, Identity and Culture as part of the Contemporary Asian Australian Poets anthology.
Who wrote the poem Mother?
Mother was written by Vuong Pham, a Vietnamese-Australian poet whose parents fled Vietnam after the war; his mother was pregnant with him when she left her homeland.
What is the poem Mother about?
In the poem, the persona plucks his mother's grey hairs while she recalls her youth in Vietnam, her escape from war and the sacrifices she made so her family could build a better life in Australia.
What are the main themes of Mother?
The poem explores the sacrifices of migrant parents, the trauma of leaving one's ancestral and cultural home, the turbulence of assimilation, and the power of nostalgia, memory and storytelling to mend cultural connection.

Same module

More Module A texts

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