Hearken

“Abstract Soldier” by Greg Pitts

soldier hearken
give battledress ear
to indelible truths
be alive to the death
all about you hear
murmuring deep from
below troubled ground
dripping caverns that
drain blooded soil
into pools of creation
primordium fluids of
earth calling spirits
to home swirling
mortal red sacrifice
into her molten gold
core casting trophies
and armaments
medals of patriots
oaths and hard victories
up into continents
raising green mountains
and heaving blue seas
making over new life
out of death never
flagging successions her
beating heart pulsing
its wax and wane
phasing of peacetime
and war blended essence
of history annals in
broad rolling overlap
waves when the quiet
and crash of the calm
and the chaos appear
indistinguishable
and while you in your
fealty and flesh are
forever remembered
you sadly will find you
are not always honored

 

 

From my books Bullets from Bones and Legacies (vol. 1)

Poppies

 

“Poppy Field IV” by Diane S. Dean

 

 

petals drawn
through warm blood
drip their sacrifice
staining pressed
peaceful lapels
with remembrance
of lives never lived
beyond wars
lost to exigent
perils of politics
fouled with aggression
demanding and daring
the best of our youth
stand and fight
for the principled
causes of liberty

each generation
has answered that
terrible call
rising tall
to the challenge
each time without fail
laid their beautiful
bodies between
right and wrong
in those reddening
fields where their
valor would seed
and volition
would propagate
delicate monuments
flowers for heroes
to decorate memory

 

 

(originally posted November 2013)

Remember Tomorrow Today

 

“Tomb of the Unknown Soldier #10” by Axel Ventura

 

halberds and hubris

hatchets and hatreds

armaments dragged

through the terrible

tides of repetitive

ignorant histories

killing fields run with

red wave after wave

humanity’s bloodshed

collected in morbid

black pools in which

drown and dissolve

tragic sacrificed

white bones of youth

reft of innocence

whole generations

the best of us

taken from time to

their premature tombs

stolen links from

the past to the future

great violent gaps in our

means of becoming

more noble more wise

and more civilized

casualties number

the holes in the soul

of society leaving but

evermore woebegone

chance to attain a more

peaceful posterity

Tempest Tossed

“Homeless Veteran” by Judith Rhue

 

glyphs tell my story
crayon on cardboard
squatting on steam-grates
muscle memory twitching
my battlefield fingers
I’m hungry and can’t find
the freedom I fought for
could you kindly
spare some of yours

Photo from pinterest.com

 

(originally posted November 2013)

We Cry for Our Own

(Originally posted June 2013)
 
 

the first time
I sat on sloped grass in the dusk
near the apex and cried
full out spasms
spontaneous reflex
irrupting the middle of me
ripping long dormant grief
from my unwounded organs
depleting flat wailing
rang harsh in my voids

I’ve always been moved
by similar sites
but this delta of gabbro
calls only to mine
they were each and all mine
my own muddled half-mad generation
these cold chiseled names
who were killed in my place
stood where I could have been
stepped where I could have run
when the bullets or shrapnel
cut their lives down

these cold chiseled names
were killed in my place
leaving life and the journey to me
and in traveling it
at the apex
I cried

 

“Reflections” by Lee Teter

 

Smell the Soil

“Abstract Soldier” by Greg Pitts

 

 

in the corners of soil
squared shoulders cut
into the fit of their fate
corners cut to receive
cornered caskets of
youth who were cut
to believe that the
smell of a man cut
by fear is the smell
of a coward a man
to be cornered and
cut from the ranks
so as not to dilute the
acute smell of duty

Soldierwood

Photo from pinterest.com

(Originally posted here February 2014)
 

birch crisply buttoned
against onslaught of winter
elegant defiance

Gold Stars

Gold Star Mother’s Banner

 

carried by the flood
all the life that might have been
tears of mothers

The Bugle

Black Iris photo from pinterest.com

 

mournful call of taps
tears of a grateful nation
black iris in bloom

Parallax

“Soldier” by Marten Jansen

binocular vision
displaces the truth
mislocates twin images
right and left phantoms
in overlapped blurs
poor ocular orbs
fooled by off-center
rivalrous angles of light

binocular vision
intrinsically least
of reliable senses
untrustworthy organs
who lie to themselves
about everything seen
their perceptions all
called into question

binocular vision
a handicap turned
vital talent engages
the brain to make
tangible sense of illusion
to calculate honesty
fixing existence exquisite
with accurate clarity

hence may he draw down
a bead on a target
his mind not his eyes
will well carry the day
kill the enemy
right where he stands
no distortion of conscience
a parallax rectitude