War
I spend too much time
On Twitter, following
The war—probably
On the wrong side—
Nothing is in me to care.
The helmetcam clips,
First-person shooters
IRL—the tanks—
The missile-eye view,
The maps—I am no lover
Of gore—war is the only
Drama of the world; all
Else fades from the clays,
But we know who Gilgamesh slew.
What is in us of this war?
War is mud and work,
Fear and snow and flame.
Concealment is not cover.
Cuddle in heavy things:
Metal or brick or dirt—
Best of all is dirt,
Yards of black mud,
Safe as a mother’s love; but
Winter is murder, when dirt
Is ice—how you gloried
In the summer, in your war!
Yours to take as you chose,
Yours what you knew was yours—
Mine to fight if I chose.
The oldest template,
Half of Thucydides.
“The child with the butchered throat
Was too young to be named.”
The street is frozen ash,
No buildings but positions,
Used, raked and abandoned—
The baby is a human shield.
The sniper left his piss bottle.
The shell got him on the stairs.
“The war starts now.”
I have fought at law before—
Grim folly is forever
The mother of war; even
The enemy’s missteps
Unnerve you; either
Reflecting some subtle plot,
A sinister metal silence—
Or, still more frightening,
A terrible blindness—
Conscience of a rocket,
Starving as rabies—
An animal power,
Utterly superior to reason
And sweeping down its weapons.
Learning to fight is besting
This beastly fear of beasts;
War is the father of man—
Now will it father our son.
Judge, let the record reflect
That I am too old for this shit.
“And damned be him that first—”
The drone’s sick buzz,
Rising Doppler rush
Of inbound pounds,
The missile’s jerky hiss
And crump of heavy shell,
Are symphonies of youth—
Mars is kissing your soul.
The spirit of victory is life;
Jupiter Optimus Maximus
Grew on me these leaves,
Thistle never olive—
That some who crave should wear!
Who steals them, steals ash,
Rips pity from its tap—
“Who comes to Russia with the sword
Will perish by the sword.” Tanks,
Crabs at government speed,
Heavy moron robots,
Split brick to ochre—
Home’s iron dust—
Back up, fire, turn,
Roll and shoot again,
A gas-puff from the tube—
A sabot-round in the face
Of Hohol or Katsap.
Fuck yeah fuck!
That one’ll leave a mark—
War cannot tell us apart.
War makes its own end;
War’s project is peace—
The gods pick whose.
And even peace itself—
Peace of any flower—
Peace disappoints
Some of all and all
Of some. Summers come.
Grape finds autumn,
Leaves, parties, wine
With rust’s deep bite—
Dirt returns its profit.
Every peace is flavored
In every particle of bone
By the powder that made it.
The warless peace is bland,
Worthless and temporary,
“Life unworthy of life.”
Musashi had it right.
I fight as one already
Shot; I am slaughtered
In the belly of my belly’s soul—
Metal my sleep mix,
Cannon my ringtone,
I expect nothing at all.
I stop to sniff the mines,
My special daffodils—
Always ready for whatever.
My ambassadors sleep
In shifts, awaiting your note;
My Glock is under the pillow.
But frankly: I hate this shit.
Who is worthy of war?
Even the howitzers,
Holes without children
Which fire and forget,
Have better things to do.
A cannon would sleep in the sun,
An old dog in the sun,
An old Portuguese fort—
At the Museu Militar
The dregs of Ultramar,
The last defender of Goa,
Pickled in a diorama
Next to Vasco Da Gama…
What of the earth, of land
And sea, when all nations
Seem waiting to die? And
We in it no more than us,
In late unchosen orbit,
Framed by holy physics,
By God’s frozen algebra
Fixed in perfect flesh—
The heartbeat of a bird,
The world’s smoothest skin—
To combat or alliance
Without divergent path.
It is late, late in the day.
If you win—which I gravely
Doubt—even if you win—
I would murder quarrel—
Break the flint of war
Itself—knit a peace
As safe as a baby-toy
On the bone of the law,
Green as sharp grass,
Sweet as blood and ice,
Chill as a cave lake,
Innocent as a young prince
And as durable as death—
Witch, you laugh! Watch me,
If by miracle you chance.
I always respected miracles.
Yet it would be a miracle.
And in victory, with arms
Open as the gate of the sun—
Since peace is the opposite of love.