1st Med Batallion Takes Care of Its Own
All Hands at 1st Med
were really humping
in the month of March.
Check it out.
700 grunts were
shit-canned to our LZ,
mostly cold-meat believers
and a few crispy critters
set down
for their final R&R.
As choppers rolled in,
bodies were stacked
by the Green Ghouls
at our GRP.
No skating
at 1st Med
in the month of March.
There it fuckin' is.
Sometimes we
at 1st Med
asked ourselves
if 700 glad bags
in one month
was beaucoup.
We were given
the straight skinny
that it was not.
Lima Charlie.
No problem. No sweat.
There it fuckin' is.
BUPERS guaranteed separate burials
by-the-numbers,
with transportation guaranteed
to cemetery of choice.
(See CEM.CHOICE.CONUS data base.)
Check it out.
by Contributing Poet Raymond Keen Copyright © 2013
VWP 2015 First published in Love Poems for Cannibals 2013
Doofus Ensign Comes to Terms with the War
(with the Aid of a Little Hash)
The smoky haze in the
NeuroPsychiatry hut
At 1st Med Battalion
Would not have been overlooked
In broad daylight.
But now an ensign psychologist
Sits alone there
Late in Da Nang's night,
Experiencing a death of ego
With the aid of a little hash.
He wonders,
"Because there is
No separation from me
And what I see,
Can psychosis be
More real than sanity?"
The ensign remembers
What Marine Corporal Pruett
Told him early that morning,
The story of shooting someone
Who was running away
In black pajamas
At a distance of 300 yards
(that’s about a quarter of a click)
In broad daylight.
As Corporal Pruett approached
The black-pajama figure
Lying on the ground,
He saw a woman
About his mother's age.
He listened
As the woman
Gasped for air,
The sound of blood
Gurgling in her throat,
Preventing her from crying out.
He listened
To the soft hissing sound
Coming from the hole
In the woman’s chest,
As a red froth
Formed around the wound,
The black pajamas
Now wet and sticky
With the woman's red blood,
Drying fast in the afternoon sun.
Drying fast in broad daylight.
Now the hashish has created
A haven of light around
The event. The ensign remembers
Hearing Corporal Pruett ask,
"What will my mother say
When I tell her I shot a woman?
Should I tell her, Doc?
Do you think she can forgive me?"
Corporal Pruett confessed,
"I am changing.
Everyday I change.
Sometimes it seems
Like years in one day
From the things I have seen,
And heard and felt."
The ensign continues to sit alone
In the hazy Da Nang night.
If now he begins to understand the war,
It is the hash that allows him to weep.
It is still very dark outside
But the ensign is sure
He is weeping
In broad daylight.
It is the hash that allows him to weep.
by Contributing Poet Raymond Keen Copyright © 2013
VWP 2015 First published in Love Poems for Cannibals 2013
Grabass with China Beach Ball Here in a Sitdown:
On Point with the REMF
We've got it covered
Here in the rear,
'Caus we're in the place
You want to be.
Here in the rear we are aka
The rear-echelon motherfuckers.
Do you have a problem with that, bushman?
Here in the rear
The Hots in Officers' Mess are great.
Officers' Country offers us
Steak once per week,
Fried chicken twice.
No rice. We prefer baked potatoes,
Here in the rear.
Or french fries.
Not to mention
Our regular ration of
Boom-Boom with hootchgirls.
For you lifer grunts in the bush,
Sorry 'Bout That!
Get over it!
Fast and furious
'Caus we are the REMF.
Do you Roger that, bushman?
OFFICIAL CHORUS FROM THE PENTAGON
(LBJ, RSM, and other honchos
went to the backroom
to enjoy a good cigar):
"No bodies of women and children
Were found. No non-combatant KIA
Were identified."
Billy won the Silver Star.
Now he’s resting here with us.
Today, during police call
He found a VC head
On the beach
Just in time
For a guest appearance
In a scoshi game of
Volleyball
Or, better yet, some soccer.
On the beach.
(Here in the sitdown
We refer to gook gourds
As our China Beach balls.)
In other words,
It's time for a scoshi
Organized grabass.
It's either that
Or ghost time.
You bic, GI?
Are we tight on that?
'Caus we are the REMF.
Do you copy that, bushman?
OFFICIAL CHORUS FROM THE PENTAGON
(LBJ, RSM, and other higher-highers,
in the backroom agree):
"The rumors
Of burning villages,
Of leveling villages,
Are bogus scuttlebutt.
American soldiers don’t
Waste women and children."
"Never happen!" they say.
You copy that big brown
Stinking fucking lie, bushman?
'Caus LBJ, he swore on a bible, bushman?
Has LBJ got our fellow Americans
Squared away on that?
Well, what are you fighting for, bushman?
OFFICIAL CHORUS FROM LBJ
"There is a price to pay
In a just peace for all.
There is a price to pay
For peace at any price.
Remember the Mayflower.
The American flag
Is not just a rag
To shine your shoes on, Boy!"
"Tomorrow feels good!
Be proud of what we are doing over there!
We are moving. We are getting better every day!"
You bic, GI?
Are we tight on that?
'Caus we are the REMF.
Do you Roger that, bushman?
Do you have a problem with that, bushman?
Well, what are you fighting for, bushman?
Cut me a Hus, bushman.
Bushman! We can't let them get away with this bullshit!
by Contributing Poet Raymond Keen Copyright © 2013
VWP 2015 First published in Love Poems for Cannibals 2013
Shake 'n' Bake Ensign's Short-Timer Song
The Vietnam War is
Not dinky dau,
Not number 10.
'Caus I was lucky enough
To snap beaucoup pictures
For my color-slide collection!
That first slide there, that's me
With my Mother's Day Medal.
Number one! Outstanding!
Hootchgirl asks me,
"When you fini Vietnam, GI?"
I tell hootchgirl
This is my wake-up.
So how 'bout one last short-time
For this short-timer?
'Caus I am gung ho to didi mau.
Didi mau on that Freedom Bird
Back to the World.
Pan Am makes the going great!
Number one! Outstanding!
Hootchgirl asks me,
"When you fini Vietnam, GI?"
I tell hootchgirl
This is my wake-up.
So how 'bout one last short-time
for this short-timer?
'Caus I am gung ho to didi mau.
Didi mau on that Freedom Bird
Back to the World.
Pan Am makes the going great!
Number one! Outstanding!
The Vietnam War is
Not dinky dau,
Not number 10.
'Caus I was lucky enough
To snap beaucoup pictures
For my color-slide collection!
That first slide there, that's me
With my Mother's Day Medal.
Number one! Outstanding!
by Contributing Poet Raymond Keen Copyright © 2013
VWP 2015 First published in Love Poems for Cannibals 2013
Prosaic Nixon
Nixon said today
that history is going well.
"An end to the Vietnam war
is at hand," he stated.
It is reported that
he danced at all five
gala inaugural balls,
enjoying himself immensely.
He smiled broadly
and appeared at ease at the time.
Nixon invited young dancers
to cut in on him and his wife Pat.
Nixon said to the girls,
"If any of you would like to cut in,
please do." He said that in ten minutes
he danced with ten different partners.
Nixon declared
a national day of mourning
for Harry Truman.
He followed this
with a national day of mourning
for Lyndon Johnson.
"History goes well,"
Nixon was quoted as saying.
by Contributing Poet Raymond Keen Copyright © 2013
VWP 2015 First published in Love Poems for Cannibals 2013
All Hands at 1st Med
were really humping
in the month of March.
Check it out.
700 grunts were
shit-canned to our LZ,
mostly cold-meat believers
and a few crispy critters
set down
for their final R&R.
As choppers rolled in,
bodies were stacked
by the Green Ghouls
at our GRP.
No skating
at 1st Med
in the month of March.
There it fuckin' is.
Sometimes we
at 1st Med
asked ourselves
if 700 glad bags
in one month
was beaucoup.
We were given
the straight skinny
that it was not.
Lima Charlie.
No problem. No sweat.
There it fuckin' is.
BUPERS guaranteed separate burials
by-the-numbers,
with transportation guaranteed
to cemetery of choice.
(See CEM.CHOICE.CONUS data base.)
Check it out.
by Contributing Poet Raymond Keen Copyright © 2013
VWP 2015 First published in Love Poems for Cannibals 2013
Doofus Ensign Comes to Terms with the War
(with the Aid of a Little Hash)
The smoky haze in the
NeuroPsychiatry hut
At 1st Med Battalion
Would not have been overlooked
In broad daylight.
But now an ensign psychologist
Sits alone there
Late in Da Nang's night,
Experiencing a death of ego
With the aid of a little hash.
He wonders,
"Because there is
No separation from me
And what I see,
Can psychosis be
More real than sanity?"
The ensign remembers
What Marine Corporal Pruett
Told him early that morning,
The story of shooting someone
Who was running away
In black pajamas
At a distance of 300 yards
(that’s about a quarter of a click)
In broad daylight.
As Corporal Pruett approached
The black-pajama figure
Lying on the ground,
He saw a woman
About his mother's age.
He listened
As the woman
Gasped for air,
The sound of blood
Gurgling in her throat,
Preventing her from crying out.
He listened
To the soft hissing sound
Coming from the hole
In the woman’s chest,
As a red froth
Formed around the wound,
The black pajamas
Now wet and sticky
With the woman's red blood,
Drying fast in the afternoon sun.
Drying fast in broad daylight.
Now the hashish has created
A haven of light around
The event. The ensign remembers
Hearing Corporal Pruett ask,
"What will my mother say
When I tell her I shot a woman?
Should I tell her, Doc?
Do you think she can forgive me?"
Corporal Pruett confessed,
"I am changing.
Everyday I change.
Sometimes it seems
Like years in one day
From the things I have seen,
And heard and felt."
The ensign continues to sit alone
In the hazy Da Nang night.
If now he begins to understand the war,
It is the hash that allows him to weep.
It is still very dark outside
But the ensign is sure
He is weeping
In broad daylight.
It is the hash that allows him to weep.
by Contributing Poet Raymond Keen Copyright © 2013
VWP 2015 First published in Love Poems for Cannibals 2013
Grabass with China Beach Ball Here in a Sitdown:
On Point with the REMF
We've got it covered
Here in the rear,
'Caus we're in the place
You want to be.
Here in the rear we are aka
The rear-echelon motherfuckers.
Do you have a problem with that, bushman?
Here in the rear
The Hots in Officers' Mess are great.
Officers' Country offers us
Steak once per week,
Fried chicken twice.
No rice. We prefer baked potatoes,
Here in the rear.
Or french fries.
Not to mention
Our regular ration of
Boom-Boom with hootchgirls.
For you lifer grunts in the bush,
Sorry 'Bout That!
Get over it!
Fast and furious
'Caus we are the REMF.
Do you Roger that, bushman?
OFFICIAL CHORUS FROM THE PENTAGON
(LBJ, RSM, and other honchos
went to the backroom
to enjoy a good cigar):
"No bodies of women and children
Were found. No non-combatant KIA
Were identified."
Billy won the Silver Star.
Now he’s resting here with us.
Today, during police call
He found a VC head
On the beach
Just in time
For a guest appearance
In a scoshi game of
Volleyball
Or, better yet, some soccer.
On the beach.
(Here in the sitdown
We refer to gook gourds
As our China Beach balls.)
In other words,
It's time for a scoshi
Organized grabass.
It's either that
Or ghost time.
You bic, GI?
Are we tight on that?
'Caus we are the REMF.
Do you copy that, bushman?
OFFICIAL CHORUS FROM THE PENTAGON
(LBJ, RSM, and other higher-highers,
in the backroom agree):
"The rumors
Of burning villages,
Of leveling villages,
Are bogus scuttlebutt.
American soldiers don’t
Waste women and children."
"Never happen!" they say.
You copy that big brown
Stinking fucking lie, bushman?
'Caus LBJ, he swore on a bible, bushman?
Has LBJ got our fellow Americans
Squared away on that?
Well, what are you fighting for, bushman?
OFFICIAL CHORUS FROM LBJ
"There is a price to pay
In a just peace for all.
There is a price to pay
For peace at any price.
Remember the Mayflower.
The American flag
Is not just a rag
To shine your shoes on, Boy!"
"Tomorrow feels good!
Be proud of what we are doing over there!
We are moving. We are getting better every day!"
You bic, GI?
Are we tight on that?
'Caus we are the REMF.
Do you Roger that, bushman?
Do you have a problem with that, bushman?
Well, what are you fighting for, bushman?
Cut me a Hus, bushman.
Bushman! We can't let them get away with this bullshit!
by Contributing Poet Raymond Keen Copyright © 2013
VWP 2015 First published in Love Poems for Cannibals 2013
Shake 'n' Bake Ensign's Short-Timer Song
The Vietnam War is
Not dinky dau,
Not number 10.
'Caus I was lucky enough
To snap beaucoup pictures
For my color-slide collection!
That first slide there, that's me
With my Mother's Day Medal.
Number one! Outstanding!
Hootchgirl asks me,
"When you fini Vietnam, GI?"
I tell hootchgirl
This is my wake-up.
So how 'bout one last short-time
For this short-timer?
'Caus I am gung ho to didi mau.
Didi mau on that Freedom Bird
Back to the World.
Pan Am makes the going great!
Number one! Outstanding!
Hootchgirl asks me,
"When you fini Vietnam, GI?"
I tell hootchgirl
This is my wake-up.
So how 'bout one last short-time
for this short-timer?
'Caus I am gung ho to didi mau.
Didi mau on that Freedom Bird
Back to the World.
Pan Am makes the going great!
Number one! Outstanding!
The Vietnam War is
Not dinky dau,
Not number 10.
'Caus I was lucky enough
To snap beaucoup pictures
For my color-slide collection!
That first slide there, that's me
With my Mother's Day Medal.
Number one! Outstanding!
by Contributing Poet Raymond Keen Copyright © 2013
VWP 2015 First published in Love Poems for Cannibals 2013
Prosaic Nixon
Nixon said today
that history is going well.
"An end to the Vietnam war
is at hand," he stated.
It is reported that
he danced at all five
gala inaugural balls,
enjoying himself immensely.
He smiled broadly
and appeared at ease at the time.
Nixon invited young dancers
to cut in on him and his wife Pat.
Nixon said to the girls,
"If any of you would like to cut in,
please do." He said that in ten minutes
he danced with ten different partners.
Nixon declared
a national day of mourning
for Harry Truman.
He followed this
with a national day of mourning
for Lyndon Johnson.
"History goes well,"
Nixon was quoted as saying.
by Contributing Poet Raymond Keen Copyright © 2013
VWP 2015 First published in Love Poems for Cannibals 2013
Bio: Raymond Keen's first volume of poetry, Love Poems for Cannibals,
was published in February 2013 by CreateSpace.
His drama, The Private and Public Life of King Able, will be published in 2015.
Five of his poems appeared in the July/August 2005 Issue of The American Poetry Review.
Since 2010, Raymond’s poems have been accepted for publication by 24 literary journals.
Most of his war poetry relates directly to his "rear area" experience as a "boot Navy Ensign"
and clinical psychologist with the 1st Medical Battalion
attached to the 1st Marine Division near Da Nang.
Raymond spent three years as a Navy clinical psychologist
with a year in Vietnam (July 1967 – July 1968).
He worked at 1st Medical Battalion on the outskirts of Da Nang,
which was attached to the 1st Marine Division.
Since that time he has worked as a school psychologist in the USA and overseas,
until his retirement in 2006.
Raymond lives with his wife Kemme in Sahuarita, AZ. They have two grown children.
was published in February 2013 by CreateSpace.
His drama, The Private and Public Life of King Able, will be published in 2015.
Five of his poems appeared in the July/August 2005 Issue of The American Poetry Review.
Since 2010, Raymond’s poems have been accepted for publication by 24 literary journals.
Most of his war poetry relates directly to his "rear area" experience as a "boot Navy Ensign"
and clinical psychologist with the 1st Medical Battalion
attached to the 1st Marine Division near Da Nang.
Raymond spent three years as a Navy clinical psychologist
with a year in Vietnam (July 1967 – July 1968).
He worked at 1st Medical Battalion on the outskirts of Da Nang,
which was attached to the 1st Marine Division.
Since that time he has worked as a school psychologist in the USA and overseas,
until his retirement in 2006.
Raymond lives with his wife Kemme in Sahuarita, AZ. They have two grown children.
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