Echo

Au croisement des cultures

Selected Poems from

"Equipment

Gulf War Poems"

Anthony Aiello

    Ammo Dump

There’s ants they said,

the other crews

from earlier shifts.

I killed them

to stay awake.

Grover (who would

smear an Iraqi’s face

with his rifle butt

after a firefight

not yet fought) slept.

                A hundred meters down

                the line, another bunker

                & another a hundred more…

No sleep for me

as the fat black things

crawled walls & ceiling,

swarmed our M-60’s nest

& a box of flares.

Spotting them everywhere,

even climbing Grover’s arms

& dream-smooth face

(before he shattered

a surrender’s kneecap

& shot a third man

still armed) as he slept.

                Out the dark, a shot

                & a feral dog’s yelp turns

                howl as the pack turns.

The ants kept coming

though I kicked every hill

to dust, ranged search-circles

round my post.  Piles of ammo

rose dark like city blocks

behind my search & destroy.

Grover (months away

from standing flushed

near a flipped truck

huffing air from smoke

beating a dead man

while I did nothing) slept.

                Still, a reassurance

                on the landline:  no fighting yet.

This isn’t war.

                ****

    Homo Furens

Strangest thing, a small owl

tame & tucked away

in the hydraulic innards

of an abandoned cannon.

Two guys from 1^st

stashed the stealthy bird

in the empty brass

from a 155mm round.  

Top found them out,

ordered it set free.

Sgt Gregory dumped it

on the ground.  Big-eyed,

the bird only swiveled

its head around, fluffed

its chest feathers, loosed

a screech eerie & alone,

but wouldn’t move.  Dick

tipped the owl with

his boot to shoo it,

but it only stared,

so Gregory stepped hard,

catching its left wing

which popped from its

shoulder.  Again, a screech

as the injured thing

flapped across the sand

before it sat, folded

its one good wing, nestled

down as if settling

into itself.  Picked up

by wind, bloody & broken

feathers kicked across desertfloor,

signifying nothing much. 

        ****

      Departure

These desertweeds are me.  Please

forgive this, the letter I never

thought to write.  In the Sandpile

summer days stay through the year,

though night changes with the season.

But as snow continues to hold in Chicago

& days remain cold without regard,

I send this letter to you, to tell you

the war is over; I return soon.

Those photos you sent, I hung

in my tent, then taped in my HEMTT

when the leadership sent us forward,

then into Iraq.  But pulled the pictures

down because your face grew confused

in my head with the dead we moved through,

& your eyes & theirs stared,

though not in the same way;

so though their scorched grins

were not your smile, I pulled down

your image when the difference faded

just the same, as the miles lengthened

to days, as sleep became a dream of driving.

Karen, this is how worlds end: 

the desertfloor the sand

the ground on which you & I stand

thrown up, blown rocket engines hurling

ahead of whickering bomblets,

the sunbright sky suddenly heavy

& black with enemy rain until every truck

& unfriendly tank halts holed

as everyone on this incredible march

comes to a shrapnel standstill. 

Those who die, die hard.

The lies & threats that brought them here

disappear.  Only the weeds remain,

unused & useless.  It comes to this:  equipment

counted signed for waiting replacement:

them, us, other GI’s, our names, all

lives trying to outdrive the night.

© 2004 Anthony Aiello