"medevac" poems
from an idea by Sheila Sharpe
In the foul heat and damp and rot and stench
After dusting off 1 the bodies of dead pals
The living and the dead, the living dead
Old Boats 2 lit off a cigarette and growled
“They say this stuff’ll **** ya.”
1 Dustoff – noun. Dust off – verb with an adverb. A dustoff is a medical evacuation via helicopter, as in “Doc, your dustoff will be here in three.” To dust off a patient, then, is to transport a patient, not to tidy him. I have recently read detailed arguments about the terms dustoff, dust off, and medevac, but no one quibbled about such minutiae along the Cambodian border.
2 Boats – a boatswain’s mate, the brains and muscle of the Navy. Boatswain’s mates do it all and are seldom acknowledged in history or art, not even in the recent film about Dunkirk. A boatswain’s mate is often addressed as Boats, and always with deference, even by the C.O.
Jul 22, 2018
Jul 22, 2018 at 3:49 PM UTC
Dumbrowski was a 6 foot 5 giant
from some hell hole mining town
somewhere south of Pittsburgh.
All sinew and bulging muscle
he looked like a painting
of the perfect, invincible warrior.
Perhaps he heard the incoming
whistle of his private RPG.
He opened his arms as if
to welcome its deadly embrace.
I was circling low overhead
in the waiting medevac chopper.
The round took him directly in the chest.
Every part of him took off
in hilarious random directions.
Arms went east and west. Head skyward.
Legs and boots travelled south.
His entire thorax just vanished.
Blood, brains and skin
splattered everyone nearby.
Later we picked up the pieces
and bagged them for his ride home;
the torn shreds of a man who had been
human one minute and meat on the ground
just a few minutes later.
Invincibility is clearly relative.
Aug 15, 2015
Aug 15, 2015 at 8:57 AM UTC
I've almost forgotten
what it is to be alive
while the memories
of broken sleep linger
while nothing else remains
I wear the same boots
that walked in enemy terrority
no emotions remain
left to make me feel
what it means to be alive
The broken bodies of children
haunt my mind every now and then
when I think of my return
to a land that holds death
that holds the unknown
Even my finger upon the trigger
can't even stir a response
like the crackle of a radio
breaking the silence of night
screaming "MEDEVAC, MEDEVAC, MEDEVAC"
While I've listened to the lectures
even read the studies
but they can't see
the burning wreckage
the bloodstained floors
Some have said its survivor's guilt
some have even said its my hero complex
but where are the answers
for even the simpliest questions
Why? Why me?
Why must I be haunted
when will I be free
to escape the memories
stirred by the media
to grab ratings
Every death, another shot
another reminder for me
of the friends I've lost
of the missions I've pulled
as the golden hour slips away
but as I stand here
just a shell, vacant and empty
of who I used to be
while the memories linger
its those feelings that elude me
Sep 25, 2011
Sep 25, 2011 at 11:51 PM UTC
One round
In the chamber,
Thirty in the magazine,
One moment makes a lifetime,
Two seconds taken to breath.
Three brothers at my back,
Four wolves in the hunt.
Five miles to ruck before rest,
Six hours to sleep tonight.
Seven days left for another week,
Eight civillians lost as collateral.
Nine houses cleared without incident,
The Tenth is where they're waiting.
Eleven minutes for the firefight,
Twelve rounds taken to the legs.
Thirteen minutes until Medevac arrives,
Fourteen month recovery.
Fifteen minutes left before lights out.
Mag is half full.
Sixteen hours to rest and clean weapons,
Seventeen men play cards in the barracks
Eighteen minutes left during fire guard,
Nineteen year old soldiers miss their family.
Twenty minute call home to loved ones.
Twentyone shots over a white headstone.
Twentytwo streets left to clear before dusk,
Twentythree families bustle in the bazaar.
Twentyfour hours in each day in hell.
Twentyfive men craving cigarettes.
Twentysix reports of gunfire this morning.
Twentyseven combatants killed.
Twentyeight days left in deployment.
Twentynine years old at honorable discharge,
30 family members waiting to welcome you home.
31 days in every month spent in the devil's sandbox.
Click
Mag is empty.
Drop mag
Draw new mag
Load into well
Hit bolt release
Continue fighting
Sep 5, 2017
Sep 5, 2017 at 4:12 AM UTC