Language

• • "Viet Nam" refers to the old name for South Vietnamese + Vietnam civil war
  • "stone" in first quote links to culture
  • "stone" in second as a metaphor for the heaviness of the emotional pain the war had done to them

  "Viet Nam use lanterns of stone?" +

  "1) Sir, their light hearts turned to stone."
• • Enjambment to ”there” to emphasise the loss of a culture and innocent
  • Matter of fact of "no more buds" highlighting the death of children and death of the natural cycle

  "to reverence the opening of buds" +

  "after their children were killed there were no more buds"
• • "quiet" connotes the rebuking of human rights
  • "burned mouth" links to the effect of the napalm gas + matter of fact

  "quiet laughter" +

  "“3) Sir, laughter is bitter to the burned mouth"
• • "flight of moths in moonlight." provides a sense of fragility to how life of the Vietnamese people were
  • "Who can say? It is silent now." has an annoyed tone due to the monosyllables

  "singing resembled the flight of moths in moonlight. Who can say? It is silent now."