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WHO THE HELL AM I

I wrote this in response to a writing contest. The Theme was
wounds and many of the writers had tired of my poems of
Vietnam and made no bones about it. Told me to let it go, to write
of other things...that Vietnam was a dead issue. Then these
same writers wrote themselves into jungle boots and had themselves
quaking in mortal fear in dreamed of foxholes forever terrified...
I got angry...very angry...and this is what came of it.

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What do I know of crimson grasses,
of guttural sounds and cries ringing
for Mother or Medic and that smell
of cordite mixed with fresh meat and blood
where lush vegetation stirred memories
of fresh cut hay baled in barns and silage shredded
as limbs and youth were shredded?
Who am I to write of war and wounds
inflicted in insanity gone beyond berserk
to hell visited upon this Earth just because
I was there? Who am I to see these things,
to remember these things as vividly as you
remember dreams you may or may not have had?
Who the Hell am I to write of war or legs gone
or medics working too hard for tears among groans
of those who would never see home nor run, or see
these words or feel these words with plastic fingers
trailing Braille with memories as vivid as that initial flash
before sounds of gasses expanding fast tore flesh from faces.
Who the Hell am I to write of walking point and fear or courage
in a place most have never seen?
Or to say we were not afraid or that fear,
once visited, found it's place and stayed in ripples
of matter someone named the brain
where scars cannot be seen except
deep in eyes or on wings of sighs as heavy now
as the wounded were in jungles most have never seen.
Who the Hell am I to write of that weight,
dead weight, thrown on choppers
in dirty ponchos while trying not to remember a face
of a friend who might of been writing this poem
thirty years after his turn at fate, a roll of dice in that place?
He lost before he had begun.
Does that mean anything? Does it mean I won?
Who the Hell am I to write of wounds or fate?
You do not want to read, to see, to feel what was real
in a year of wounds that never heal. Just who the F*ck
am I with three hearts of purple hanging with two crosses
as poets cast dice beneath my feet that I was lucky
enough to keep? Has war become so fashionable
it now is cool to write of places and things we never visited nor did?
I guess it is.
Imagination is a wonderful thing ... so is walking point.
The enemy would want to rend more than one, my friend
so point was a safer place to be when set on by an enemy.
We carried honor in our eyes, not to a flag but to all those guys
and fear became adrenaline and tears were kept inside
where they melted through gray and settled in scars
still invisible today. Who the Hell am I to write of wounds,
the smell of meat and that sickly sweet odor of blood you cannot stop
with fingers pressing deep in groins or promises to them
made in desperation when choppers could not get in;
promises no mortal man could keep when faced with life in full retreat.

Who the Hell am I?
Just a guy with hearts of purple as real as these words on this paper
too often told to let it go...
to write of Earth, Wind, Fire and Water....
Yeah, write.....
Who the Hell am I to say to you,

"Let it go, look back, salute."
Damn good advice

for a computer with a delete. I choose to remember
those wounds you never saw. I choose to remember
because there are so few of us left to recall
who they were and how they left all
or parts behind
in land you never saw, while real blood jets
from those whose wounds you did not bind.
Who the Hell am I?
Just a guy who was there before
it became "cool,"
just a guy who was there but never,
never did we stumble gripped in all encompassing fear,
never did we leave those wounds behind where terror was
a state of mind that punctuated boredom and we knew
EXACTLY
who the Hell we were.
Though young and idealistic we were not sadistic
and though we were used
WE NEVER PLAYED THE FOOL!