Like Runes
I know it must be
poetry
because it seems a
mystery
and that it’s modern
poetry
because it is
supposed to be
about the likes
of you and me
and yet the more
I look it seems
the less and less
and less I see
almost
invar
i
ably
Our Ladies’ “Heroes”
Let us call them heroes,
not negatives, not zeroes,
and praise the way
they go and slay
and leave the world with less, or fewer,
and leave a place with blood and guts
trickling down a sewer.
Let’s not say they’re nuts,
though they don’t introspect.
Let us say
that when they slay
they
in fact protect.
To myrmidons
in danger zones
the irony’s too subtle.
Let’s not say Murder! when
it’s ordered by elected men
and carried out by myriads
enlisted and anonymous
on a field of battle.
Let’s say they’re brave and valorous
as Hectors, Henries, Galahads;
we cannot call them zeroes.
The label
will enable
only if we keep calling
our soldiers heroes
and tell them it’s God’s will
when they rape and kill
and leave trails of red dust,
not something He
a.k.a. She
must
find appalling.