July Fourth
Of Every Year
Brings back Viet Nam,
And the bombs,
And gut wrenching,
Teeth clenching,
Feelings of war,
Of death,
Of the constant vigilance,
And the sorrow.
Yes, the sorrow for all
Yes, the sorrow for all
The dead and the maimed.
The sorrow for all the mothers
The sorrow for all the mothers
And all the fathers
Who buried their children
When they came home
In flag draped coffins
And body bags.
The sorrow that I came home
And they didn’t.
Every Year,
When the sky lights up,
And the booms punch
Hard and deep,
As they wrap their
Boney fingers around my throat,
And squeeze that lump,
Forcing tears
From the beep inside
From the beep inside
To leak out
And sting.
And sting.
Every year,
Every damn year
The booms take me back
To the ship’s alarm,
“General Quarters!
General Quarters!”
The flairs light up the jungle
Men yell and scream
Choppers whop, whop
Over the trees,
Shooting lines
Of glowing bullets
At men and boys below.
Our ship fires
Boom! Boom! Boom!
I pray,
“Please protect our men.
Please protect our ship.
Please let me awaken,
Awaken from this nightmare.”
July Fourth
Blasts me back
To Viet Nam
Every damn year.
I can feel that clench just at my solar plexus as I read this. It makes it hard to think of the fireworks as just pretty lights.
ReplyDeleteMushroom! This takes the glory out of war. Your words ask us to exam what we are celebrating when we thank our troops and cheer at the sounds of red, white and blue fireworks.
ReplyDeleteThank you. Wow!