The stars on the flag started falling off
when Private Walker returned home
to Tennessee after six months of being
in country in Afghanistan.

At Camp Leatherneck on the treadmill
he folded five points to pentagrams,
imagined fireworks nova his welcome back.

The flag rarely flapped in the arid silence
of base camp.  Was MIA everywhere else.

He landed unmet in
Chattanooga on Veterans Day
in time to catch the parade highlights,
which happened two days earlier,
being ignored on the airport monitors  
in the hustle of terminal traffic.

No flags decorated Broad street shops,
no watchers waived the red, white and blue.
Police motorcycles fronted the parade
and patrolled the back in sunglass alert.

Two Vietnam vets shouldering hunting rifles
marched grimly in parade formation followed
by alternating school bands and ROTC cadets.

All two thousand stars dripped down,
faded blue in the rush to show the next ad.
Every which way he looked
the rushing crowd turned his back to him.

He remembered Anousheh, the girl
whose name meant everlasting/immortal.

The child who hugged him,
kissed his forehead when he gave
her a Hershey bar from
his mom’s care package
while patrolling the base perimeter road.

The friend, the daughter, the grandchild
who died in a Taliban wedding bombing,
one week after her seventh birthday,
three days after their embrace.

His heart, his tears, his breath,
his every word was Anousheh.
All was and will be forever Anousheh.

And when he prayed
he prayed like Anousheh,
and on his knees at the airport
he faced her outbound heart
and prayed for a mutilated world.

Seldom do I hear your three syllables
Ringing along the airwaves
Seldom does anyone fighting
After the war to end all wars
Consider you or think about
A cessation of arms

We even gave you a different name
Armistice, how did you become
So out of favor?

Let the world pause once again
On the eleventh hour
Of the eleventh day
Of the eleventh month
So we may sing, dance and discover
The joys of your three syllables
Ringing along the broadcast’s airwaves

Here, love is the far proxy of look
- She is dying a distance -
Yours travels from brook to sky
To the heaven wanderings of death in my blood,
The black smoke-congested veins possessed
By the baffled realms of battlefield
By the horrors of the mundane
From this old mouth, emptied of kisses.

The sky will never hold more
Than all the paths of soldiers’ unreturning,
Laid out the length of undone goodbyes.  
Their eyes that sleep on the wind,
Palace of last breath,
And the rain that falls, expectant of windows,
And those left within to live without eyes.

Dear Granny,

I saw someone
a week ago,
In the streets
on my way back home..

Her wrinkled skin burnt by the Sun
Her attire frayed and patched with dust
An empty oil can of crumpled tin
A humble sum peeks shyly from within
Her hand stretched, a cup formed from her palms
It shakes too furiously to beg for alms
She speaks a language alien to me
Yet her eyes tell me a universal story
A tale of a debt that was never paid
Kindness was dealt a hand of apathy instead
And the care with which a seedling grows
Was not returned as winter crept close
Because fall came and went, and the old leaves are spent
Shed across the city streets, with none to speak for the dead

Like the world around me I know not
why I should care
Her face is that of a stranger to me
Yet I keep waking up
on account of these dreams
A similar picture, a similar scene
And at the heart of it
The face is yours,
Granny.

Love,
Soham

Look!
now they sleep      bloodless warriors
pandemonium stilled      agony slain tranquil
death sanctified in rigid cartesian rows
honored for their sacrifice and selfless valiance
laid to rest beneath mourning grasses

Ask!
where was the higher honor due them      before war
are sacred vows      to be profaned      to be misemployed
                            
Why!
do once verdurous lives lay cold and pulseless
as spatters of red petals      tearfully fall
families breathing wistful flowers
distilling rue      with lulling scents

Adjudge!
all men      who enact lies
dishonoring crossed graves
greed calibrating scales of injustice
bodies tilted high by tonnages of gold
Aurelian kisses      vaulting wars riches

Do Not!
dishonor a warrior’s willingness to die
for bravados mouth is a soldier’s tomb
do not forsake truth and honor    our only faithful ally
ask ten-thousand whys      before one soldier dies
before the bugler's breath      sounds death's lamenting cries

Think!
Contemplate war’s fiery womb
hatred    born inextinguishable
good & evil     indistinguishable

Look, what stillborn bones lie locked in battle
this fleshless monster      we mis-named peace        


gv.2014


Matthew 6:13 . . . deliver us from “evil”
Evil as translated in 6:13 is "Poneros" A name also attributed to Satan
Which means:  "he is not content unless drawing others into the same destruction as himself"
(From Lexicon to the New Testament by Spiros Zodhiates, TH.D

"Soon
the world
won’t have a rib intact.
And its soul will be pulled out."

A line from Vladimir Mayakovsky's 1917 poem , Call To Account

“They made a wasteland and called it peace” Publius Cornelius Tacitus

This is a special day because it's Veterans Day.
We celebrate because certain people fought for the USA.
Veterans put their lives on the line so that we can be free.
Veterans are important to you and they're important to me.
It's heart breaking to know that some Veterans are homeless.
They are heroes who we should ask God to bless.

Do I remember too much about
The strangers I meet?
There was the skinny seven year old at the
Park in Detroit, who I learned liked autumn
And colorful leaves, pumpkins and Halloween,
Scarecrows and working in the garden.
There was the Japanese lady at the
Hotel breakfast in DC, calmly eating a donut,
Staring off into space, gracefully lost in her own
Thoughts and feelings.
There was the happy man at the
Veteran’s home, who talked gratefully to me
About his experiences, desperate to
Share his story.
There was the single mother on
The park bench, allowing me, a total stranger,
To watch her children while she took
A much needed nap.
There was the black man at the
Movie theater, who offered me his
Extra bag of popcorn and made sure I knew
When the jump scares were.
Do I remember too much about
The strangers I meet?
I don’t think so.
Appreciate humanity,
Because you never know when it might be gone.
Each one of these people were beautiful,
In their own way, and they weren’t even
Trying to be.
They were just living their lives,
And I was fortunate enough to be a part of them
For a short time.
You know why they were beautiful?
Because they just were.