Excalibur’s Outreach Program
On move-in day maybe John Steinbeck
would have understood my so stationary
posture in front of the ‘Camelot’ housing
project sign as if it were a more manageable
sized mural like the A Few Good Men metal
recruiting poster adjacent to our local post
office
unable to repudiate the government advertising
unable to summon a two man chainsaw team
unable, scars later, to not parachute down atop
two Kansas City drug dealers stalking me under
an abandoned train tower displeased that I’d
declined their offer to market smokable herbs
unable to shake off the blood stripe street past
before I ever stood still on the yellow footprints
Internal Amphibious Assault
Before I could tell the
drill instructor that I
didn’t want any boot
camp inscription-dents
in my nose, he brought
down his starched hat-
brim, so I had to tell
an investigating Series
Commander that the
flattened campaign
cover still had a hat
cord that would make
a fine garroting wire
for the next time I
encountered striped
military machismo
***
mice to mouth
villagers rocking the fly
sprayed by child merc
Eradication Vapor
New world war
magician morphed
to bloody bullet
forceps sliding
down an old
M-60 barrel like
a cleaning rod
bringing out a
field embalming
machine as the
TV audience
experienced
everything
from behind
screen glass
splash guard
safer than
funeral parlor
employees
Hot Brass Burn
It was so insignificant, just
a 5.56 millimeter shell casing
ejecting, lodging between my helmet
and right cheek. Attaching itself like
a mad biting bug that kept swallowing
incinerated face meat. Finally issuing
me a second cheek scar, so that each
time I observe it during self-reflection
or a daily shave-I really see a vast portal
to the world where kids battle it out
inside the cargo pockets of history as
the antiquated arming switch for elite
economics flips on like a black light
bulb throwing 200 watts, and that hot
brass burn is still everywhere even inside
a submarine burrowing ashore like a
sand shark devouring beach life or
inside the big ghost battleship graveyards
still docking quietly inside my cells as
the IED explode into our service youth
while civilians continue to get killed and
over 21 thousand plus global terrorist
attacks since September 11, 2001 finally
brought home to the Boston Marathon
Bombings tragically starting it all anew
And I still hear a little boy’s voice from
Manchester Elementary School playground
yard in 1970 telling me that they kill kids
at Boonville Boys Home as I couldn’t do
anything then and another judge smacks
his gavel and de-jails a teen telling him
there’s opportunity in the service as
Juvenile Court Judge Mark Ciavarella
begins his light stay 28 year sentence
for kids to cash incarcerations that
may lead some future parolee to the
nurturing boot camp blankets waiting
just beyond an undetermined release, so
go ahead and roll down your pillow
windows and let the dreams-n-daymares
back in as taps rolls on with eternity
***
black dot blender
turning the blades to ten
young goth juice junkie
***
skirt lifting times
tired sewing shop women
hem high London
Leave a Reply