This blood-dripping
saddle says to me
that my lord
(the old bastard)
will possibly not
be cantering, cantering
home for tea
on spreading green swards
with a monkey-puzzle tree
because, in fact,
he's beastly dead.
He was a very silly
man, we can all agree,
and it was not, when you
come to think of it, such
a very bad thing that
he died in glorious battle
for the sake of family.
Dead as a doornail
fancy that.
We'll need to look
to the future
more or less
in which certain
things will happen,
not, perhaps, good
things, but, for the
moment, anyway,
I think, I half believe,
we are secure
among our loyal friends
and the usual plague
of greasy sycophants.
But but but
there is a danger still
that the whole damn
wobbly edifice
so haphazardly erected
by our drunken forefathers
will fall and crumble
and all will tumble
down
down
down.
I would vote
if we had elections
I would walk
if I had legs
I would salute
if I had arms
I would laugh
if my mouth
wasn't ripped
apart and covered
with bandages.
War is not so bad
not really
you can pick up
a few things
here and there
souvenirs
loot, cash
as long as you
don't get killed
or maimed
forever.
You have to
go your own way
have to wing it, baby
but isn't that
what we all believe?
leaving others
the civilians
the refugees
the emaciated survivors
to pick up the pieces
or fall down dead
so sorry, amid
a rubble of broken dreams.
Being young
helps, in a way, that's
what makes it work,
not having to think
when you drag out
the next screaming
prisoner. Kill em all
says the sergeant, guilty
and innocent alike, filthy
fuckin foreigners.
Kill em all: why not,
the sergeant said so.
You sit at home, but
democracy is a tough job
You sit at home, and
I envy you at times
I want to go to the Mall
I want to go to the movies
I want to drink in the smell
of a blonde-haired girl
or a brown-haired girl
or any sweet-smelling girl at all
while I clean and oil
my M-16, my deadly beauty,
my waking and sleeping
constant companion
and I know you know that
you can't do what I can do
I can kill people.
When I go home
I could work in a store
stacking shelves
but I think I'd rather
go to college instead,
I think I'd kinda like
to become a lawyer,
get myself a job
with the government:
they'll never admit it
but they owe me.
