My grandpa always told me
“being a war veteran is scary.”
You sign up for a life of piles of
empty bullet shells and hollow bodies,
both equally as tall as the other.
A flip of a coin decides whether
you’ll kiss the ground one more time,
or be buried beneath it.

Every man and woman who
has ever faced evil is a hero,
regardless if their heart beats or sleeps.

Don’t tell me you’ll set a table
for a man who’ll never come
but not give five dollars to
the man on the corner with a sign reading
“war veteran. Help. PTSD. HELP.”
Don’t you dare look at
a marble block and cry,
but look at a homeless hero
in utter disgust.

Where has humanity gone?
Where are we now
that we shun the survivors
and immortalize the dead?

We don’t need another big shiny rock
to carve the number of good people lost:
We need hospitals, psychiatrists, therapists,
real people to help real heroes...
not cookie cutter doctors
paid by a government too worried
about being the world’s #1
nuclear weapons producer.

If I ran for president, I’d win with the slogan
“**** our future, I have a big gun.”