My old friend is unsettling
Looking, watching, listening
Waiting for me behind every corner
On every dark road
At the end of every knock
Behind every door.

Why can't I just go to the store?
I need to be armed.
Just in case someone means harm
You never know, you never know
How can you know?
What's waiting behind that door.

I hear you've been worried I'm here again, with more
Looking, watching, listening.
Don't you know I'm your only friend?
I've been here from the start.
You try to ignore my calls,
My breath on your neck

You're playing against a stacked deck.
My friend, don't you see?
I've never left
I'm here, I'm here,
I'm always here.
My hand is on the door.

You aren't a friend; you weren't here before
Looking, watching, listening.
But now you're coiled like a belt
Closing around my neck
Tied to the railing
Hung for all to see.

My friend? You're my worst enemy.
My friend would let me sleep.
My friend would say stop to eat.
My friend would give me space.
You aren't my friend.
I'm not opening that door.

I'll slide in, quiet, like death on the floor,
Looking, watching, listening.
I'll keep your eyes fixed and dilated
So you won't miss a thing
We'll stop that noisy wheezing
So you can appreciate me.

I am your friend
Your only friend that answers your calls
Your only friend that sees your pain
Your only friend.
Your only friend.
Your only friend, opening the door.

My friends are gone, lost in the war.
Looking, watching, listening,
You've kept me company,
Kept me warm.
You've fed my hate
Starved my love.
Kept me inside, never late

For my scheduled anxiety,
Which fills every second.
Every minute.
Every hour.
Every day.
I'm too busy to answer the door.

I'll let myself in, it isn't a chore.
Looking, watching, listening
I'll keep you company
While you work on your schedule.
We don't need to talk;
I already know.

I promise it won't interrupt
Or alter your rigid plans.
Staying inside is hard work
Without an old friend.
Let's get up.
Open this door.

I'd shut you up, if it weren't for your
Looking, watching, listening.
I have a friend made of steel and fire
Willing to have a chat with you
His voice is colossal with thunder
He'll stop your talk.

He'll stop your talk in a heartbeat.
He'll –

I’d jump at the chance to ride shotgun
on Henry’s medicine wagon
rolling from city to village
hawking 'Stickin’ Salve' and 'Oil of Gladness'.

We’d ride into Elmira’s County Fair
and set up over by the lake.
I’d fix old Diamond a pail of oats
and draw her a bucket of water.
while great, great grandpa
squeezed on his Union coat
and arranged his potions on the shelves.

Henry’s voice would boom
across the water like a megaphone
and people would gather close -
lured in by the old codger's
hypnotic banter of miracle cures -
and perilous Civil War battles.
  
He’d swear on his mother’s lumbago
that 'Stickin’ Salve' works just as fine
as the lead and powder
he’d fired at Cedar Mountain.

The folks would shake with mirth
whenever he bellowed,
“I’m Henry Howard from Bunker Hill -
Never worked and never will."
Women would tug their husband's sleeves
and they’d bring me pennies and dimes.

After dusk we’d tally the coins
and latch down the wagon for the night
then sleep side by side on the grass
beneath the New England stars.

At sunrise I'd wipe his brow -
to ease him gently back
from the thunder of enemy shells
still firing in his restless sleep.

We'd cook up some bacon and biscuits,
hitch Diamond up to the wagon
then head south through the rolling hills
along the Tioga valley.
We’d breathe in the fresh country air
and tip our caps to the farmers.

If Henry would come to tap my shoulder
some promising morning in spring
and whisper "the wagon's hitched outside,"
I’d go in a Tioga minute.

*December,  2006

Jerry Singing at his Lathe

Slim and mustached
Jerry sang his heart out
in overalls at his lathe –
the Mario Lanza of Kent-Moore Tools.

Curled metal gathered at his feet
as he cut hard steel into usable parts.
He glanced at the prints,
reset the turret to take a second pass
and belted out another chorus.

Jerry retro-dreamed of New York,
of lessons, certificates, Juilliard
and arias finished with outstretched arms –
visions derailed but unforgotten.

Global madness sent him to France.
With a pack and an M1 in place of scores.
Jerry helped set Paris free
yet never left a song on its stages.

Kent-Moore paid him well
and masked by din of colliding metal
Jerry sang and sang and sang all day
for rivet guns and turret lathes.
His voice would melt your heart.

*July, 2006

boy coils in the lawn
& early air.
grass touching him wet,
smoke crawls from his lips,

into the blue awoken,
or sky before his face.
there it dances like wild life lived
& falls away with breezy.

dearly herb to glossy reds,
he purses, thus to inhale.
sparked ember, spark clench, fist to fist.
life given to life encapsulated.

the sense of it goes steady,
goes patent cool.
he exhales, and looks to the south,
where his legs once were.

CONGRESSIONAL EDICT

Go home soldier;
No whining allowed.
Shut up soldier;
It’s enough to be proud.
Be proud you fought
To defend our systems.
Just stop *******
About things wrong with them.

Go away, soldier;
So what if you lost a leg?
Man up, soldier;
It is not polite to beg.
You did your bit fine
It serves no purpose to lag.
Shut up now, for good;
Your words seem to be a brag.

Bug off, soldier;
Yours is an old sad song.
Who cares soldier?
We’re important, so go along.
We have work to do now
And laws to undo and make.
We have no time for cripples,
How much whining can we take?

Buck up, soldier;
The churches will feed you.
Not us, soldier;
We no longer need you.
You fought for your country
In the wars of yesterday.
That is an old, sad story.
So, just go away.

A broken hero walks through the streets of his home town
Home from a war he didn't understand
But was pretty **** good at fighting
He's got a slight limp and it's making
All the cracks in the sidewalks a little different
And every time he trips
He wishes he were back in the desert
His camouflage can't hide him here
His bullet proof vest can't protect him from piercing glances
And his gun won't stop the advance of the fear crawling through him
It won't stop the uncertainty closing in on him
For all the times he was in a fire fight
Shooting his gun into nothing  but the night
He never felt uncertain
You get shot at and you shoot back
It was never complicated
Your best friend dies
But you've taken enough best friends' lives that
It just seems logical
But here at home he can't take his safety off
He takes his gun apart
Hangs the different pieces on his wall
A modern art tribute to the dog tags he's yet to deliver to weeping widows
He's come home to a world he can't associate with
A family he can't share stories to
A job force that doesn't know what to do with him
Because they're not quite sure how you get a bachelor's degree in blowing **** up
Or how dodging bullets relates to crunching numbers
He's come home to a girlfriend who feels just guilty enough
To have *** with him for a few months before leaving him
For his best friend she's been with for years
And a G.I. Bill just big enough to drink his way through his thirties
Which will be just long enough to learn he can't drown the sounds of battle
Out with Busch pounders
That beer goggles don't work on memories
And that MRE's don't quite cut it for Thanksgiving dinners
He can't form any saliva in his perma-cotton mouth
So he seals envelopes with his tears
As he sends out the letters that were supposed to be just in case
But just in case turned out to be the case a little too often
He finds it unsettling that every time he goes out
He know he's coming home
He forgot to stop at red lights for weeks
And when he remembered he was supposed to
He still didn't stop
It's not that he wants to die
He just wants to know he still can
He wakes up too early for everybody else
Makes his bed, folds his socks, shines his boot
Eats breakfast, and watches the news talk about withdrawal
As he wipes the sleep from his eyes to prepare for the symptoms of his own
He sleeps on the floor till the Army Surplus Store
Delivers his cot
It's not that he doesn't want to be normal
It's that he forgot how
He's bought the plane tickets
But still doesn't know what to say
He knows they already know
But he has promises to keep
What can he say to the wives of men
That were stronger than him
How's he supposed to stay strong for them
When he wasn't strong enough to die with them
And once a year his home town holds a parade
In honor of the fallen veterans from the community
He keeps wondering why he has yet to be invited
Because the only thing keeping him alive is his heart beat
He's not offended
But he feels more at home at the cemetery
With the dead and buried
Than in the church next door
They morn them in
He wakes up at night in flop sweats
From nightmares of bullets lodged in his chest
That he's come to call
Dreams

cushions make a queer backstop
after five long years of stone
friends and family fray the nerves
after five long years alone

a backyard barbecue a battle
when the fight is finally won
still he fights to find the joy
in the laughter of his son

a bonafide war hero
not as brave as he might seem
when he can’t escape the feeling
that coming home was just a dream