Mid-September Memories
Wrapped in morning fog
the fabled bridge fades
into the immediate past
Apprehension and curiosity
blend in a mind pondering
what awaits across the sea
in the next great unknown
of this muddled life
Time seems to crawl
each day a challenge
each night a mystery
moments of terror interrupt
stretches of boredom
laugh at the absurdity
cry when lives are wasted
for reasons undefined
Experience reverses course
the bridge now speckled
with shadow and sunlight
yet apprehension and curiosity
still swirl in a mind like
the eddy of a swift stream
carrying its swimmer into
the vastness of another
great unknown
by Contributing Poet Mark Fleisher Copyright © 2022
VWP 2022 First published in Incidental Moments -- New and Selected Poems (MercuryHeartlink 2022)
Bunker Mentality
A helluva way to die,
wondering if I’d see
my next birthday,
huddled like a rat
in the damp dank darkness
of a bunker reinforced
with sandbags and steel plates,
hearing the mortar shells
overhead, praying short rounds
do not test our protection
Yes praying, because there are
no atheists in foxholes or
in bunkers for that matter
So much for the New Year’s truce
Bullets whizzing about,
ricocheting off the walkway
leading from my hootch
to the latrine sent me
scrambling to the bunker
Praise the Lord and pass
the ammunition, only there
is no ammo, no weapons,
we are non-combatants
or so we are told; tell that
to Victor Charlie with
the AK-47 and his pal with
the RPG launcher
So much for the New Year’s truce
An eternity passes before
the welcome staccato chatter
of machine guns rakes
the tall grass bordering
our living quarters; then
the whoosh of rockets
destroying the mortar tubes,
Cobras spitting their venom,
assuring these invaders
will not live to fight another day
Tet January 1968
From Tan Son Nhut Air Base
Happy New Year to all
by Contributing Poet Mark Fleisher Name Copyright © 2020
VWP 2020 First published in ? VietnamWarPoetry.com
~
Remembrance
A granite slash black as onyx
slices across the earthen path,
seemingly endless,
names carved and chiseled into the stone,
58,307 - the populations of Royal Oak
and Dearborn Heights in Michigan,
of Federal Way in Washington.
Rick is present and accounted for
on Panel 40e, Row 12
19 days from home;
There’s John, Row 54 on Panel 40e,
a month served, recently graduated
from his teenage years.
I know them, I know the others,
not by name, but by kinship.
They gave me a medal,
a star of bronze suspended
from a red, white and blue ribbon,
then they took the medal back,
not enough to go around, they said.
The numbers game, again.
They insisted I fill out
a hometown news release,
even when I said my
big city newspaper wouldn’t
give a damn about my medal.
And who cared about
the trauma embedded
forever in my mind
or the poison
sprayed into my cells?
The numbers game, again.
Rick and John,
they got medals, too
P as in Purple, H as in Heart,
PH for Posthumous,
No hometown news releases
to California -- Sun Valley for Rick,
Redwood City for John.
Didn’t know John came from Redwood City
until I looked it up the other day,
found his name on a war memorial.
I didn’t know any of that when
we drove into town that October day,
parked the car, had a coffee at Starbucks,
then drove away ... I wish I knew.
A couple of guys among the many
caught up in the damned numbers game.
The numbers don't tell the stories
of how many more with
shattered minds and broken bodies
struggled with their aftermaths
Uncle Ho and Uncle Sam arm wrestled,
slogging through rice paddies,
slashing through jungle,
sloshing through Delta swamp
And Uncle Ho won the struggle -
Hey, It's not JFK City,
It's not LBJ City,
It's not RMN City,
It's Ho Chi Minh City
Now more than 6,800 from new conflicts
await their monument proclaiming
their sacrifice to an uncertain cause,
heroes absent from Christmas dinner tables,
Chanukkah festivities, Native feast days,
celebrations of Our Lady.
Only 6,800 -- how dare I say only
for each is a lost treasure
known to me through kinship
and by a father’s grieving eyes.
We excel at building monuments
to failures, convincing our conscience
absolution is granted.
by Contributing Poet Mark Fleisher Copyright © 2016
VWP 2016 First published in Intersections: Poems from the Crossroads
by Mercury Heartlink 2016
Senses of War
Beams of sunlight bounce
off this odd-shaped,
silver-sided carrier,
a calling card sent to
eager shooters
aching for heroism
jungle deep or hidden among
mountainside green
Naked to the world
this white whale,
configured to carry elite to war --
war the brass pick and choose
Crazy or daring,
foolhardy or gutsy,
you make the call.
I am aboard -- why?
I want to see war
I want to feel war
I want to smell war
Land in the Central Highlands,
where the killed-in-action scoreboard
reads "them -- a helluva lot; us -- not as many"
Them -- no name, slant-eyed slopes,
Us -- whites, blacks, browns,
sons, fathers, husbands, brothers,
"we regret to inform you ... "
Bulldozers push decaying remnants
into earthen craters carved
by whispering birds of prey bellowing
peace is our profession but for now
we'll bomb you to kingdom come
Send more bombs, bullets, rockets,
more bodies willing
and unwilling to dare death
for the all-holy body count
proves we are winning
I see war
I feel war
I smell war
I am 24-years old
by Contributing Poet Mark Fleisher Copyright © 2016
VWP 2016 First published in Intersections: Poems from the Crossroads
by Mercury Heartlink 2016
Can Tho
Vietnamese restaurant near
The Cleveland Park Metro
Washington, D.C.
Autumn 1986
Sipping corn and crab soup,
inhaling perfume of flavors
talking with the owner,
he came from
Can Tho
in the Mekong Delta
Can Tho, spring of 1968,
My photographer Sam and I
in the makeshift operating room
in the ramshackle hospital,
awed by Air Force surgeons
pulling away the mangled flesh
and shattered bone --
all that’s left --
one side of the woman’s face,
collateral damage,
the cynical gift from chunks of metal
delivered by one army or the other,
only she knows -- maybe
The docs give her a new jaw,
a reconstructed cheekbone,
in time she will eat solid food,
talk to her children,
sing to her grandchildren,
and I know she will thank the docs,
and I know she will curse,
one army ... or another ... or both
by Contributing Poet Mark Fleisher Copyright © 2016
VWP 2016 First published in Intersections: Poems from the Crossroads
by Mercury Heartlink 2016
Wrapped in morning fog
the fabled bridge fades
into the immediate past
Apprehension and curiosity
blend in a mind pondering
what awaits across the sea
in the next great unknown
of this muddled life
Time seems to crawl
each day a challenge
each night a mystery
moments of terror interrupt
stretches of boredom
laugh at the absurdity
cry when lives are wasted
for reasons undefined
Experience reverses course
the bridge now speckled
with shadow and sunlight
yet apprehension and curiosity
still swirl in a mind like
the eddy of a swift stream
carrying its swimmer into
the vastness of another
great unknown
by Contributing Poet Mark Fleisher Copyright © 2022
VWP 2022 First published in Incidental Moments -- New and Selected Poems (MercuryHeartlink 2022)
Bunker Mentality
A helluva way to die,
wondering if I’d see
my next birthday,
huddled like a rat
in the damp dank darkness
of a bunker reinforced
with sandbags and steel plates,
hearing the mortar shells
overhead, praying short rounds
do not test our protection
Yes praying, because there are
no atheists in foxholes or
in bunkers for that matter
So much for the New Year’s truce
Bullets whizzing about,
ricocheting off the walkway
leading from my hootch
to the latrine sent me
scrambling to the bunker
Praise the Lord and pass
the ammunition, only there
is no ammo, no weapons,
we are non-combatants
or so we are told; tell that
to Victor Charlie with
the AK-47 and his pal with
the RPG launcher
So much for the New Year’s truce
An eternity passes before
the welcome staccato chatter
of machine guns rakes
the tall grass bordering
our living quarters; then
the whoosh of rockets
destroying the mortar tubes,
Cobras spitting their venom,
assuring these invaders
will not live to fight another day
Tet January 1968
From Tan Son Nhut Air Base
Happy New Year to all
by Contributing Poet Mark Fleisher Name Copyright © 2020
VWP 2020 First published in ? VietnamWarPoetry.com
~
Remembrance
A granite slash black as onyx
slices across the earthen path,
seemingly endless,
names carved and chiseled into the stone,
58,307 - the populations of Royal Oak
and Dearborn Heights in Michigan,
of Federal Way in Washington.
Rick is present and accounted for
on Panel 40e, Row 12
19 days from home;
There’s John, Row 54 on Panel 40e,
a month served, recently graduated
from his teenage years.
I know them, I know the others,
not by name, but by kinship.
They gave me a medal,
a star of bronze suspended
from a red, white and blue ribbon,
then they took the medal back,
not enough to go around, they said.
The numbers game, again.
They insisted I fill out
a hometown news release,
even when I said my
big city newspaper wouldn’t
give a damn about my medal.
And who cared about
the trauma embedded
forever in my mind
or the poison
sprayed into my cells?
The numbers game, again.
Rick and John,
they got medals, too
P as in Purple, H as in Heart,
PH for Posthumous,
No hometown news releases
to California -- Sun Valley for Rick,
Redwood City for John.
Didn’t know John came from Redwood City
until I looked it up the other day,
found his name on a war memorial.
I didn’t know any of that when
we drove into town that October day,
parked the car, had a coffee at Starbucks,
then drove away ... I wish I knew.
A couple of guys among the many
caught up in the damned numbers game.
The numbers don't tell the stories
of how many more with
shattered minds and broken bodies
struggled with their aftermaths
Uncle Ho and Uncle Sam arm wrestled,
slogging through rice paddies,
slashing through jungle,
sloshing through Delta swamp
And Uncle Ho won the struggle -
Hey, It's not JFK City,
It's not LBJ City,
It's not RMN City,
It's Ho Chi Minh City
Now more than 6,800 from new conflicts
await their monument proclaiming
their sacrifice to an uncertain cause,
heroes absent from Christmas dinner tables,
Chanukkah festivities, Native feast days,
celebrations of Our Lady.
Only 6,800 -- how dare I say only
for each is a lost treasure
known to me through kinship
and by a father’s grieving eyes.
We excel at building monuments
to failures, convincing our conscience
absolution is granted.
by Contributing Poet Mark Fleisher Copyright © 2016
VWP 2016 First published in Intersections: Poems from the Crossroads
by Mercury Heartlink 2016
Senses of War
Beams of sunlight bounce
off this odd-shaped,
silver-sided carrier,
a calling card sent to
eager shooters
aching for heroism
jungle deep or hidden among
mountainside green
Naked to the world
this white whale,
configured to carry elite to war --
war the brass pick and choose
Crazy or daring,
foolhardy or gutsy,
you make the call.
I am aboard -- why?
I want to see war
I want to feel war
I want to smell war
Land in the Central Highlands,
where the killed-in-action scoreboard
reads "them -- a helluva lot; us -- not as many"
Them -- no name, slant-eyed slopes,
Us -- whites, blacks, browns,
sons, fathers, husbands, brothers,
"we regret to inform you ... "
Bulldozers push decaying remnants
into earthen craters carved
by whispering birds of prey bellowing
peace is our profession but for now
we'll bomb you to kingdom come
Send more bombs, bullets, rockets,
more bodies willing
and unwilling to dare death
for the all-holy body count
proves we are winning
I see war
I feel war
I smell war
I am 24-years old
by Contributing Poet Mark Fleisher Copyright © 2016
VWP 2016 First published in Intersections: Poems from the Crossroads
by Mercury Heartlink 2016
Can Tho
Vietnamese restaurant near
The Cleveland Park Metro
Washington, D.C.
Autumn 1986
Sipping corn and crab soup,
inhaling perfume of flavors
talking with the owner,
he came from
Can Tho
in the Mekong Delta
Can Tho, spring of 1968,
My photographer Sam and I
in the makeshift operating room
in the ramshackle hospital,
awed by Air Force surgeons
pulling away the mangled flesh
and shattered bone --
all that’s left --
one side of the woman’s face,
collateral damage,
the cynical gift from chunks of metal
delivered by one army or the other,
only she knows -- maybe
The docs give her a new jaw,
a reconstructed cheekbone,
in time she will eat solid food,
talk to her children,
sing to her grandchildren,
and I know she will thank the docs,
and I know she will curse,
one army ... or another ... or both
by Contributing Poet Mark Fleisher Copyright © 2016
VWP 2016 First published in Intersections: Poems from the Crossroads
by Mercury Heartlink 2016
Bio: Mark Fleisher has published four books of poetry, most recently Incidental Moments -- New and Selected Poems. His work has appeared in numerous online and print anthologies in the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, and elsewhere.The Albuquerque, New Mexico, writer received a journalism degree from Ohio University and held reporting and editor positions in New York and Washington, D.C. newspapers
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