Cold bones,
   numbed brain,
   blackened sockets
   hide two eyes.
   Frozen fingers
   swell through gloves,
   cradled weapon
   held with love.
   Fetching memories
   gone astray,
   wondering will it
   ever end...
 

BY:  John Kent

   A SUMMER WALK
 

   Trudging on a shell-scarred road,
   columns of two,
   through swirls of dust
   in the early twilight hour;
   quilted rice paddies on either side,
   reaching out to brooding mountains.
   The hot summer wind
   blowing the incense
   of feeding rice shoots through
   our nostrils...we gag!

   We've come upon this place,
   in this valley of rice,
   where the dead lay red, withered;
   scattered about like autumn leaves
   blowing in the wind;
   poked by hunched shapes
   wailing like the lost souls
   of a netherworld...echoes in my brain.
   The leaves carried away,
   one by one.

   The sky in reddening hue,
   subdued,
   bringing the night down slowly.
   Our bodies baked by the hot sweat
   of a summer day.
   The leaves turning rancid,
   The aroma of shellburst and decay,
   pungent in the air.
   We walk quietly, with reluctant step,
   suppressed conscience,
   to another front,
   another place...like this one.
 

BY:  John Kent

EYE OF THE STORM
 

   Intently, I listen
   and the night tells me,
   yes, I am quiet
   and I am soft.
   It is not too cold
   and I have hung out the moon,
   so you can see through the darkness
   ...a little.
   And the light flashing
   above the black hills
   ...you can see
   but not hear the booming.
   It is much too far.
   And the night tells me,
   do not drift into complacency,
   war is an insidious beast,
   it will kill you while you sleep.
 

BY:  John Kent