On Cigar Island
In Quang Nam Province (1969)
I walk in a mausoleum
of trees. Insects run in
cold bare feet over my
white figurine bones.
My tracks are words,
words nobody will hear.
I have discovered coldness.
It is a card index of my
pending life sweeping
like a winter’s wind down
from the high country,
charging on invisible legs,
coming like so much madness,
coming to smother the candle
I carry on my tongue,
sealing me inside this corridor
of trees. My linen shroud a
canton blue, and in continuum,
I will search and destroy no more
along the eerie paths and trails
of this South China Sea shore.
by Contributing Poet Philip Bartram Copyright © 2023
VWP 2023 A version of this poem was published as
“Date” in Et Cetera, spring 1974.
On the Street Without Joy
In Quang Tri Province, Viet Nam (1968)
The plane circled
Like a silver-winged horse
Prancing in the trappings of a full sky.
The engines coughed and snorted
Blue, orange, and white mists, each
Caught on the vortex of the wind
Then settled upon the waters, leaves
And grasses.
Beyond the pagoda where the road
Forked a black water buffalo lowered
Its head and charged into the dunes.
Graves on both sides of the road
Opened and skeletons sat and waved.
Some held signs,
“No soliciting,” and “See you soon.”
We smiled and waved back.
Curtis snapped the safety off
And flicked a half-smoked Pall Mall
Into the sand.
In the just cracking afternoon sun, we
Moved in our rising stamped-out steam,
Hardcore, swamp fox and grunt, into
The village. I daydreamt of carrying the
Homecoming queen to the most secluded
Rock-laden shore of Maine where she would
Balance with delight the whole of my body.
The village shared nothing if not
Pots of unattended rice and a few
Chickens that willingly laid their necks
Across a fallen log, and calmly waited
The quick motion of the axe.
She lay in that familiar position,
A blast-toned mannequin staring infinitely
Into the sun, blown back from the tunnel that
Ran beneath a stove’s stone hearth to fields
And woods. Perhaps in her life she had
Buried the Bouncing Betties on the paths
To the village or dipped the punji sticks
In cobra venom. Perhaps she had envisioned
Mortality, discarded her scandals and folded her
Clothes to one side. Perhaps she had touched
Her thighs and breasts, hoping to be held
One last time in that position, then rose
Caught a breath and fell back into that
Mass of acrid gas released from above,
Coughed and screamed to be heard.
The hunched figures that toiled
In the trench-foot paddies suddenly
Disappeared. In rapid succession,
I heard the dull thumps of metal leaving
The tubes. In a few warped seconds,
The lung-sacked air that sustained me,
In quick release, cooled my skin to blue.
The coal-forged bombs, carried on the spine-
Cracked backs of peasants over hundreds
Of miles from the Chinese border, ripped
The whole of air and white Caucasian flesh.
Curtis fell first, still conscious, found the
Stone courage to curse the one time hit.
“Doc” Phillips, knowing only the dust’s off-color,
Bend by his own silhouette in an obtuse light,
Zigzagged to each wounded soldier, a bona fide
Sawbones with a magical black satchel floating
With each just above the ground in their shared
Boyhood fantasies, and did his utmost to stop
The bodies being released to earth.
Quickly from inaction, the strength of our
Motion lay outward from the center of
The village. My finger in tight pull, my
Cheek welded against the black stock,
I joined the grand cacophony, swung the
M16 in a slow ever increasing arc and
Danced on the rim of hell. With my
Helmet just out of reach, I squinched
Expecting that single well-directed bullet,
Fired from a hidden spider-hole; obeying
The physics of force and free fall, to smack
Into my head.
Throughout the night, Doc crawled
Below the green tracers to clip the dog
Tag from the bootlace of each dead soldier.
A stealthy cat bound effortlessly
Closer then stopped and sobbed.
Ghosts of French legionnaires
Escorted each fallen soldier in turn back
To the graveyard, back to the junkyard
Of the dead. Each laid without that
Strange ritual of flowers, psalms, and dirt.
Puff the Magic Dragon frolicked
Above dropping red ribbons that waved
Gently back and forth as they reached
The ground. I felt I could hoist Curtis
On my back and climb one of those ribbons,
Hand over hand, and deliver him into the
Belly of the dragon, then slide down,
Thousands of feet, chest overinflated, mouth
Full of obscenities, hair and rifle ablaze,
Riding the full eight seconds.
The hunched figures out of half-sleep,
Out of the shy half-moon rescinding,
Returned to the paddies. In the redundant
Whop, whop, of the Slick’s blades, Curtis,
Propped against a wall, still giddy on the full
Hit of morphine, smiled and lit a Pall Mall.
The village gave us an essence, and we,
At least for a brief time, returned it. And
Then the absurdity continued except for the
Dead. I walked straight into the cool stream
Nearby, an ancient wanderer returning to
The sea, and washed away the blood, the mud
And sand, the god-awful odor of fish heads and
Rice, and whatever else remained of yesterday.
Somewhere, the stealthy cat backed quietly
Into his lair contented on devouring the bloody
Heart of the water buffalo.
by Contributing Poet Philip Bartram Copyright © 2023
VWP 2023 First published in VietnamWarPoetry.com
The Messenger
(Published in Stone Country, October 1982)
We are punching holes in the night’s air
Like the fourth of July,
And for an instant,
I am an elephant passing through the eye
Of a needle.
Nothing moves in the blood-washed light,
But the grass huts backing into darkness
Where the light ends.
Beginning to feel the stiffness
From the advancing graveyard,
I move slowly
Under the weight of nylon pack,
Helmet, and day-old blood
That life can never reclaim.
Through the unheld weapons
Turning to air,
I slump at the edge of the path
And stare at the arms
Thrust wrist-deep in the earth
In a last effort
To take life
From the precious minerals.
A woman kneels beside me
And strokes my forehead.
Slowly, I begin falling
Beyond all geography,
Beyond all walls,
Like a lunar stone,
Gray as horsemen,
Gray as sleep,
Beyond all miseries, my head
Cradled upon her naked bosom.
She knows, she knows
And whispers in my ear
The Lord’s Prayer
That stops the fever.
The weather rinses
Her potato color to white.
I love in order to be loved.
I tell her
She is beautiful
And kiss the white gleam
Of her thighs.
She is a puppet rising
From the depths of my desires
Bringing me rice
And bits of fish heads.
It is hot
And her cool hands
Sooth my back.
I am a savage
Whose face is beard-stained
Like charred wood
Of the last village.
The wind rises like a cornerstone.
Her last coarse eyelash dissolves
With my touch.
I can leave nothing here.
I can take nothing with me.
Grass grows woven in the vacuum
Of rib cages and
The dead will inherit the face of the earth.
by Contributing Poet Philip Bartram Copyright © 2023
VWP 2023 First published in Stone Country 1982
In Quang Nam Province (1969)
I walk in a mausoleum
of trees. Insects run in
cold bare feet over my
white figurine bones.
My tracks are words,
words nobody will hear.
I have discovered coldness.
It is a card index of my
pending life sweeping
like a winter’s wind down
from the high country,
charging on invisible legs,
coming like so much madness,
coming to smother the candle
I carry on my tongue,
sealing me inside this corridor
of trees. My linen shroud a
canton blue, and in continuum,
I will search and destroy no more
along the eerie paths and trails
of this South China Sea shore.
by Contributing Poet Philip Bartram Copyright © 2023
VWP 2023 A version of this poem was published as
“Date” in Et Cetera, spring 1974.
On the Street Without Joy
In Quang Tri Province, Viet Nam (1968)
The plane circled
Like a silver-winged horse
Prancing in the trappings of a full sky.
The engines coughed and snorted
Blue, orange, and white mists, each
Caught on the vortex of the wind
Then settled upon the waters, leaves
And grasses.
Beyond the pagoda where the road
Forked a black water buffalo lowered
Its head and charged into the dunes.
Graves on both sides of the road
Opened and skeletons sat and waved.
Some held signs,
“No soliciting,” and “See you soon.”
We smiled and waved back.
Curtis snapped the safety off
And flicked a half-smoked Pall Mall
Into the sand.
In the just cracking afternoon sun, we
Moved in our rising stamped-out steam,
Hardcore, swamp fox and grunt, into
The village. I daydreamt of carrying the
Homecoming queen to the most secluded
Rock-laden shore of Maine where she would
Balance with delight the whole of my body.
The village shared nothing if not
Pots of unattended rice and a few
Chickens that willingly laid their necks
Across a fallen log, and calmly waited
The quick motion of the axe.
She lay in that familiar position,
A blast-toned mannequin staring infinitely
Into the sun, blown back from the tunnel that
Ran beneath a stove’s stone hearth to fields
And woods. Perhaps in her life she had
Buried the Bouncing Betties on the paths
To the village or dipped the punji sticks
In cobra venom. Perhaps she had envisioned
Mortality, discarded her scandals and folded her
Clothes to one side. Perhaps she had touched
Her thighs and breasts, hoping to be held
One last time in that position, then rose
Caught a breath and fell back into that
Mass of acrid gas released from above,
Coughed and screamed to be heard.
The hunched figures that toiled
In the trench-foot paddies suddenly
Disappeared. In rapid succession,
I heard the dull thumps of metal leaving
The tubes. In a few warped seconds,
The lung-sacked air that sustained me,
In quick release, cooled my skin to blue.
The coal-forged bombs, carried on the spine-
Cracked backs of peasants over hundreds
Of miles from the Chinese border, ripped
The whole of air and white Caucasian flesh.
Curtis fell first, still conscious, found the
Stone courage to curse the one time hit.
“Doc” Phillips, knowing only the dust’s off-color,
Bend by his own silhouette in an obtuse light,
Zigzagged to each wounded soldier, a bona fide
Sawbones with a magical black satchel floating
With each just above the ground in their shared
Boyhood fantasies, and did his utmost to stop
The bodies being released to earth.
Quickly from inaction, the strength of our
Motion lay outward from the center of
The village. My finger in tight pull, my
Cheek welded against the black stock,
I joined the grand cacophony, swung the
M16 in a slow ever increasing arc and
Danced on the rim of hell. With my
Helmet just out of reach, I squinched
Expecting that single well-directed bullet,
Fired from a hidden spider-hole; obeying
The physics of force and free fall, to smack
Into my head.
Throughout the night, Doc crawled
Below the green tracers to clip the dog
Tag from the bootlace of each dead soldier.
A stealthy cat bound effortlessly
Closer then stopped and sobbed.
Ghosts of French legionnaires
Escorted each fallen soldier in turn back
To the graveyard, back to the junkyard
Of the dead. Each laid without that
Strange ritual of flowers, psalms, and dirt.
Puff the Magic Dragon frolicked
Above dropping red ribbons that waved
Gently back and forth as they reached
The ground. I felt I could hoist Curtis
On my back and climb one of those ribbons,
Hand over hand, and deliver him into the
Belly of the dragon, then slide down,
Thousands of feet, chest overinflated, mouth
Full of obscenities, hair and rifle ablaze,
Riding the full eight seconds.
The hunched figures out of half-sleep,
Out of the shy half-moon rescinding,
Returned to the paddies. In the redundant
Whop, whop, of the Slick’s blades, Curtis,
Propped against a wall, still giddy on the full
Hit of morphine, smiled and lit a Pall Mall.
The village gave us an essence, and we,
At least for a brief time, returned it. And
Then the absurdity continued except for the
Dead. I walked straight into the cool stream
Nearby, an ancient wanderer returning to
The sea, and washed away the blood, the mud
And sand, the god-awful odor of fish heads and
Rice, and whatever else remained of yesterday.
Somewhere, the stealthy cat backed quietly
Into his lair contented on devouring the bloody
Heart of the water buffalo.
by Contributing Poet Philip Bartram Copyright © 2023
VWP 2023 First published in VietnamWarPoetry.com
The Messenger
(Published in Stone Country, October 1982)
We are punching holes in the night’s air
Like the fourth of July,
And for an instant,
I am an elephant passing through the eye
Of a needle.
Nothing moves in the blood-washed light,
But the grass huts backing into darkness
Where the light ends.
Beginning to feel the stiffness
From the advancing graveyard,
I move slowly
Under the weight of nylon pack,
Helmet, and day-old blood
That life can never reclaim.
Through the unheld weapons
Turning to air,
I slump at the edge of the path
And stare at the arms
Thrust wrist-deep in the earth
In a last effort
To take life
From the precious minerals.
A woman kneels beside me
And strokes my forehead.
Slowly, I begin falling
Beyond all geography,
Beyond all walls,
Like a lunar stone,
Gray as horsemen,
Gray as sleep,
Beyond all miseries, my head
Cradled upon her naked bosom.
She knows, she knows
And whispers in my ear
The Lord’s Prayer
That stops the fever.
The weather rinses
Her potato color to white.
I love in order to be loved.
I tell her
She is beautiful
And kiss the white gleam
Of her thighs.
She is a puppet rising
From the depths of my desires
Bringing me rice
And bits of fish heads.
It is hot
And her cool hands
Sooth my back.
I am a savage
Whose face is beard-stained
Like charred wood
Of the last village.
The wind rises like a cornerstone.
Her last coarse eyelash dissolves
With my touch.
I can leave nothing here.
I can take nothing with me.
Grass grows woven in the vacuum
Of rib cages and
The dead will inherit the face of the earth.
by Contributing Poet Philip Bartram Copyright © 2023
VWP 2023 First published in Stone Country 1982
Bio: Philip Bartram lives in Bel Air, Maryland. He writes occasionally and has been fortunate to have a few poems published in several internet blogs: Camel Saloon, Pyrokinection, Stone Country, and Black Poppy Review. He served in Vietnam (Jun 1968 thru Jun 1969) with the 5th Mechanized Infantry, 1/77 Armor (Quang Tri), and 3/16 Artillery attached to the 1st Squadron, 1st Cavalry Regiment (Tam Ky) as a radio operator/forward observer.
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