​​Loosely Translated From a Japanese Movie, or So I Thought 

Last name Zilla, first name God,
please come stomp hell out of everyone . . .
Jesus living in Waco, TX, wearing glasses?  
No friggin’ way!  Speaking of Jesus, how come 
he won't do miracles anymore, like
turning David Copperfield into a serpent
--or my rod into a flowering staff . . . ?
Once, dowsing for inspiration, I began to suspect
that smoothness was art and density could well
pass for design: say, jars of dill pickles 
on a dusty shelf in a bonecool basement in
1968 when I am sneaking a few puffs
on a stale Winston, thinking about the war
in my living room called Vietnam where
I just watched the grim-faced babies blow shotguns 
with their M-16s, red-eyed grunts hunched 
in the colors of the jungle, mouths shaping angelic o's, 
blowing kisses through blue steel--before I turned
the channel and found you, 
last name Zilla, first name God.  Amen.


by Contributing Poet  David E. Poston   Copyright © 2020 
VWP 2020     First published in  The Main Street Rag 3, 3 (Fall 1998)  

Bio:  David E. Poston  lives in Gastonia, NC, where he teaches occasional writing workshops for Hospice, writes book reviews for Pedestal Magazine, and serves as a co-editor of Kakalak. He turned eighteen the year after the draft ended, but his high school years were consumed by the Vietnam War and the social turmoil it stirred in this country. He vividly remembers watching the TV news one evening as a reporter interviewed GIs in the field and his crew filmed them blowing shotguns through the barrels of their M-16s. It was, for the 13-year-old son of a Southern Baptist minister, a surreal moment in a bewildering time. The 2017 Ken Burns documentary on the war included that footage, and seeing it again after almost fifty years brought the moment back to life.