The End of the Viet Nam War Is a Lie

by Mushroom Montoya

29 March is the anniversary

of the "official",  

not the real,

end of the Viet Nam war.

 

I stirred my coffee

this morning

with a U.S. Navy spoon,

that overflowed
with angry cubes
of bitterness.

Each one bore the label:

Viet Nam War

Brought to you

By the Military Industrial Complex

Each sip of my bitter coffee

bled memories

that I didn’t want to open.

 

We were still firing rockets

from our ship

That December,

nine months after,

After the fucking war
was “officially” declared
over.

It was a damn lie.

Each sip of my bitter coffee

cut slits in my gut
setting my mood for the day: 

Capital P

for PISSED.

 

But it is far more than just pissed.

My cousin died over there.

My shipmate died over there.
Hundreds of thousands of mothers
And fathers grieve for their dead children,

 

Who died over there,

 

Dead children whose deaths

and suffering succeeded in NOTHING

but making the Military Industrial Complex

richer,

While the whole world

became poisoned with Agent Orange

And a misdirected hatred

of those who were sent to serve.

While those of us
Who served there
still grieve
For the parts of us
that got killed there.

The Day We Sent Armed Forces to Yugoslavia

 I am a Viet Nam combat veteran. As I was packing for a trip I found an old journal entry (of sorts. It was a letter I wrote to myself). I wrote it the day that we sent armed forces to the Gulf War. I had been at work in the Los Angeles GSA office when I heard the news. Jeremy, my firstborn son, was a Hospital Corpsman (medic) in the Naval Reserves and I knew that he would probably be deployed to fight with the Marines.

I ran and hid in Patsy's (a coworker's) cubicle. My eyes were burning - my heart was pounding. The news report shot pangs of terror into me, shooting fear that my firstborn son would be deployed, sent to war, and be killed. Norm and Greg (coworkers) tried to comfort me. When I regained my composure, I returned to my cubicle.

When I saw Patsy, I remarked, "Those are really big, are they heavy." I was referring to her earrings. She replied, "Oh, my boobs? They are big and heavy." It made my smile come forward and lighten my heart again. I Told Patsy and Wanda that I had hoped that the Viet Nam vets would be the last veterans and that the VA hospitals would be turned into Public health facilities. Someday, someday.

I heard an announcer on the radio give a short discourse on pornography. He said that we have it all backward. "Why," He asked, "do we prevent children from viewing nudes and photos of sexual acts, saying those items harm children?" He said that nudes do little harm when compared to the REAL pornography - Visual Violence. The violence on the TV and movie screen, the violence in comic books, and Soldier of Fortune magazines. American society has perverted morals. Our society even praises violence. When will we wake up? When will we learn that the arms for peace are HUGS, not guns?