Shrapnel in the Heart: September 2004

Night Trails

I turn to read the shadows in your eyes.
Sunlight slowly twists off the hills.
Silence speaks. We watch a half moon rise.

I walk alone, but often you surprise
my steps with yours. We puzzle through 'untils.'
I wish to read the shadows in your eyes.

Each ridge we've gained has cost us breath, but sighs
tell proud fatigue when evening chills.
Silence speaks. You watch a half moon rise.

Ferns bite at trails bent for highs
we may not trek before time stills.
I need to read the shadows in your eyes.

A fox calls. Doves stifle replies.
Will fading light disclose what darkness fills?
Silence speaks. I watch a half moon rise.

Horizon bleeds to night. We disguise
our questions and defer our separate wills.
I cannot read the shadows in your eyes.
Silence speaks. We watch a half moon rise.

Sky Gunners by Johnny Hubbs

Sometimes in the night, I awake to the Day
Only to wonder, what made us feel this way

Yea, and in my mind, I think of the time
Flying over the tree-tops, of Viet-Nam

All of us that served, did it with Great Pride
From Bein Hoa, to China Beach,
just watching the tide

Now and many years later, I think of that time
Flying, over the tree-tops, of Viet-Nam
Gunners in the sky,
this may be the day you Die
Flying over the tree-tops, of Viet-Nam
Praying everyday, that Viet-Nam wasn’t a Lie

Flying in those tin-can helicopters,
they said wouldn’t Fly

But, everybody knew, that what you needed,
it came from the sky,
Gunners in the sky,
this may be the day, you Die
Flying over the tree-tops, of Viet-Nam

Many Grunts were in the jungles of the Bush
Looking to each other for trust
Because, you see, out there it was a Must
To look to each other, for that trust

Many Grunts, in the Jungles of the Bush
Now, Gunners in the sky,
this may be the day, you Die
Flying, over the tree-tops, of Viet-Nam . . .

Flying, over the tree-tops, of Viet-Nam . . .
Flying, over the tree-tops, of Viet-Nam . . .

By Johnny Hubbs (Copyright 1997)

Dedicated to all, Helicopter Crewmembers, and to the Grunts we served . . .

You will note that this is not a war story . . . I was not there. However, these words have been lurking in my head, and heart, for a number of years and, until this moment, were unshared.....

I Never Felt by Patrick Camunes

I never felt . . .

The training and the

Torture I went through . . .

Went with the torture that others suffered

And the pain and death I was taught to inflict.

I never felt . . .

I could take a life . . .

until a 15 year old VC girl crossed my path.

BLOW IT!... BLOW IT!... The orders came down,

The AMBUSH . . . You MUST BLOW It!

I never felt . . .

The taking of a life

And the spilling of blood

Would be what was expected of me . . .

. . . But it was my duty to accomplish the "task".

I never felt . . .

That what I was taught to do

Would cause so much anguish to my soul . . .

And the taking of this single LIFE

Would be a torture and a nightmare . . .

For the rest of my life!

I never felt . . .

. . . innocent

. . . or clean

. . . nor anything at all . . .

'cept

fiend.

By: Patrick Camunes
Copyright © 1999

Memories by Karen

As I looked at him, his eyes returned the stare
His skin was black, mine white, though we didn't care.
Instant brothers, as from one mother's womb,
Now lying together in our earthen tomb.

He held my hand as he gasped for breath,
Our blood mingled as we fought against death.
We had met as youngsters only months before
And now lay dying, old men, from this war.

We talked quietly in our muddy hole;
We shared those moments and bore our souls.
He told of a wife and a baby due.
He spoke of his little boy, now only two.

He was afraid of dying, of leaving them alone.
He started to cry, and in pain, then, to moan.
It seemed insane that moments before,
We both had been healthy - had life by the door.

I had been walking just a few feet ahead
Hadn't noticed the mine planted in the field's green bed.
He lunged ahead, tried to push me away
The mine had exploded; our world turned to gray.

His legs were torn off, as though they didn't exist
His lips had been touched by Death's final kiss.
He gave up his life without any regret
To save me, his brother, he had only just met.

We held each other as the choppers grew near.
We held onto life, so precious and dear.
Both of us knew, they'd arrive too late,
Death was waiting, holding open it's gate.

The tears ceased flowing from his eyes of brown;
He pulled me closer, lifting his head from the ground.
"I'm dying, my brother," he whispered low,
"Tell them at home, so that they will know

That I died for my country, our freedom to save
For others to live, my life gladly I gave.
Don't let them forget us or the blood that we shed,
For to die without cause, when you die, you're just dead."

"Make them remember what their freedom costs.
Help them to know it can be easily lost.
Don't let them forget me or the other Vets
For we gave our all and paid a large debt."

He let out a sigh, as I gave him my vow,
Then he lowered his head, as though in a bow.
A smile appeared upon his face
And I knew he was now in a better place.

I'll never forget him - what he gave up for me
And for you, my brother, because you see,
He died for us all and we cannot forget
He died bravely - a Vietnam Vet.

Karen SP5, USA Vietnam 1969-1970 Dedicated to my brothers and sisters
who gave their lives.
copyright 1989

The following was written for me by my brother, when asked
what he remembered about the day I left for Vietnam. He is
now and always has been special to me.

Hidden Rituals By Forrest Brandt (23/11/98)

It’s a hell of a party,
lieutenants let off steam,
take risks with booze,
cigarette dinky dau and army authority.

I leave early,
wander along an unfamiliar path,
listen to the sounds of the Vietnamese night:
a lone chopper circles overhead,
jeeps and trucks lumber and whine around the base,
bits of conversation float upon the evening air as I pass tents and buildings.
The local crickets, birds, and lizards sing of love and territory.

Creamy light spills out from a doorway.
Voices and the sound of running water come from within.
Fifteen feet away two soldiers,
naked to the waist,
wrestle with a garden hose and a body that dangles from stirrups in the ceiling.

I’ve found the brigade morgue.
I want to leave,
but curiosity pushes me closer.
The shiny pink skin of the back and legs is pierced by hundreds of tiny holes.
Bloody water washes down the torso,
flows along the arms and head,
plunges in a crimson stream and curls into the drain in the floor.

I quicken my pace,
shake my head,
breath deep,
push back against the rising bile.

I wonder how these two young boys,
forced to wash the dead,
will blot the scene from their minds.

I imagine them,
years from now,
lost to booze and nightmares.

I wonder how the victim died.
I pray it was fast and clean.

I wonder why I have been spared the war’s dirty jobs.

What star of grace keeps me safe in this base camp?

For fretful hours I shiver and toss,
sleep only in small snatches,
disrupted by my own nightmares: scenes of combat,
of steel and explosives and soft tissue,
of kids tenderly washing the bodies of kids.

How Do You Say I Love You in a War? by Bobbie Trotter, (1981)

I

I couldn’t believe what I was seeing.
All the GIs kept telling me that these people aren’t like us.
They don’t value life as we do.
How then do you explain that woman when told her son was dead,
How do you explain her beating her head
Against the pavement until her blood flowed
And mingled with his?

II

I was brought up to think of prostitutes
as something outside myself.
It never occurred to me to feel sorry for them.
Why then would Sno spend all the money
She earned last week,
To buy me a present?

III

Little war baby, so helpless, so sick, so weak.
They tell me you can’t make it
Until th nest supply shipment arrives
And I can’t come back this way.
I would give you the food from my mouth.
It is one thing to help a grown man die,
It is quite another not to be able
To help a baby live!
What can I do for you?
I hold you and that says I love,
I clean your festered skin and that says I love you
But nothing I can do is enough.
I shall remember you all my life.
I shall remember you most when I hold my own.
If I love him, in remembrance of you,
Perhaps that will be enough.

IV

Sometimes when it hurt too much
Or when the guilt piled up
Or the loneliness became overshelming
Some of the guys would play
Long, haunting melodies on the sour old guitars
Warped from the constant wetness.
Inevitably there would be a Baptist among us
Usually a black, black lad from Georgia or Alabama
Whose velvet, wordless voice would make us weep
I tried not to
For fear it would never stop.

V

It’s only a telegram,
Typed out words, common words, you use every day,
Words that usually mean nothing.
How could that young wife know how my heart broke?
How could she know how much I loved her
When I stood over her young,
Battered and broken lieutenant
And wrote those stupid, stupid words?
"Honey, I love you. Don’t worry about me."
How can she ever forgive me?

VI

I stare and wonder at you
And you at me
And we are enemies.
You killed my brother. He shot you.
You left your rice paddy for the enemy’s hospital.
I left my cornfield for my brothers
In that hospital.
I should hate you. You should hate me.
Why do we stare?
You take hold of my hand and love passes
Through our fingers.
Who is our enemy, if we love one another?

Flight of Fate by Ray

The sea ahead ..full of possibilities
waves of terror....followed by the calm.
I threw a flower into the water,
not knowing the fate ahead.

A sea of soldiers.....full of possibilities
waves of terror.......followed by the calm.
I threw my sister into the water,
not knowing her fate ahead.

Watching soldiers waiting for their planes,
a huge hanger....filled with emotion....yet quiet.
Seaweed uniforms, whitecap duffle bags... no smiles,
not knowing their fate ahead.

I saw death walking through the crowd...
two men...parting the sea of soldiers.
Arriving from the war....hardened...berets oddly in place,
not knowing their fate ahead.

These men shook me....they shook the soldiers.
If death could be smelled ...I smelled it.
My sister looked so small ...so out of place,
not knowing her fate ahead.

In hours ..turned minutes..turned seconds.. she walked away
boarding a plane that just unloaded the dead.
I cried ....I cried.... I cried....
not knowing the fate ahead.

Ray
copyright 1998

WHAT IS A SOLDIER

A soldier is someone who trains for a skill we all hope they never have to use.

A soldier salutes and respects the flag that he knows is more than a piece of cloth.

A soldier will leave his loved one's at a moments notice to protect the lives of people he dosn't even know.

A soldier will spend lonely nights in a far away land during the holidays, knowing he is serving the greater good.

A soldier will lay down his life protecting a country where so many care so little about the freedoms they take for granted.

A soldier is the heart and soul of who we really are.

A soldier is someone we all owe a great deal of gratitude.

The Rescue

Hey, Sloan said,
there's a Cobra down in the river.
He ducked into the bunker for binoculars.
I squinted across the valley at the Ba Long.

Olive motion on jungle green,
a gunship wheeled,
hung nodding at a point on the far ridgeline,
circled to clear profile above the horizon,
then dropped toward a blob in the river.

From his field-mount laser-ranging glasses,
The artillery observer
scanned the opposite ridge
for movement at known firing positions.
When the Cobra settled clear,
he called in a few rounds.
One-Five-Five millimeter shells whistled overhead.
Dust rose from the ridge with a belated mutter.

A pair of Hueys
droned in from the coast
and angled down to orbit the wreck --
at that distance,
small and silent as dragonflies.

The advisor on the hill
reported the action,
but his rear base had nothing on the story,
and his radio had no aircraft bands.

The miniature dance
rose and fell over the river.

Sloan thought they were trying to raise the wreck.
Through the binoculars
he could see it lift, drop, and lift again.

One Huey broke off
and landed on a gravel bar
downstream from the wreck.

The other, with the gunship, held orbit
till a Chinook lumbered onto the scene.

The lighter craft climbed away.
The Chinook settled, wagging over the wreck,
typically slow to connect its sling.

Finally, yard by yard,
it lifted the Cobra out of the water.

The Huey on the bar
rose behind the Chinook
and led the others out of sight down the valley.

Weeks later,
a Huey settled in and shut down
on the pad above our bunker.

Sloan took up our mail
and jawed with the door gunners.
They had the story line
for the airborne mime we had seen.

The Cobras were coming back
from rocketing positions near Khe Sanh
when a 51-caliber plugged the lead ship.

The pilot held it upright
as it hit the river,
and climbed free.

His buddy machinegunned the 51-cal position
and called in the Hueys for the rescue.

They dropped a lifeline to the pilot
and lifted to pick him up.
But the slack snagged on the wreck.

The lift on the lifeline
jerked him under --
and the snag held.

The Commando's Prayer

Give me, my God, what you still have;
give me what no one asks for.
I do not ask for wealth, nor success,
nor even health.

People ask you so often, God, for all that,
that you cannot have any left.

Give me, my God, what you still have.
Give me what people refuse to accept from you.
I want insecurity and disquietude;
I want turmoil and brawl.

And if you should give them to me,
my God, once and for all,
let me be sure to have them always,
for I will not always
have the courage to ask for them

The Extraction

John Wayne didn't play this one.
Mathematics did:

forty-eight men to go,
one chopper in the flight shot down.

Each surviving bird, in turn,
settled among the incoming shells
to take an overload of casualties,
classified gear,
and evacuees
till rescue reached capacity.

Two Viet Namese, two Americans
kept some extra ammunition
and maybe a wish for one more sortie;

they held six shattered bunkers
eroding from the hilltop
under mortar fire.

When things fell quiet in late evening,
they chatted with base camp by radio.

But their sign-off was hard to copy
over the rattle of rifle fire.

The logbook reads:
2100 hours --
Dogpatch, this is Red Dog four.
They're coming through the wire

The Last Patrol - Anonymous

When A Man Is Lost, He Returns To His Last Known Thing,

It Is Possible The Same Is True For Souls

I Have Rummaged Therefore Through Childhood

for The Essence Of My Manhood

I Have Found Only Where The Boy Was Born,

And Where He Was Taught To Love and To Trust

But Since Im Am No Longer He....It Is Meaningless

Delightful But Without Value

Allot Of Good Men Died In Vietnam, But Like Some Of You, I Was Born There

So Sometimes Like You,

I Just Get Tired Of Waiting For Me To Feel Like Me Again

On Days Like That, (Late Nights Actually)

I Just Pull Back Into My Bivouac Of Middle Age

To The Very Edge Of The TV, Hunker Down Into The Chair

And Get Black Faced In My Mind And Blank In My Heart

Ready To Slip Under The Wire For One Last Patrol

And With The Last Strands Of The Star Spangled Banner In My Ears

The Tube Turns The Night Into Snow,

And I Am Gone...Quietly, Quickly,

Past The Concertina, On The Downhill Slope Of My Nightly Fears

Into The No Mans Land Where All My Dreams Explain

All I Failed To See When First I Lived It

Oh Oh.... There It Is,

Be Careful Just Like It’s Real Life,

Step Over Those same Trip Wires Like The First Time,

Hey? Can I Screw Up? Can I Blow Myself Up On A Late Night Reveille?

A Little On The Frantic Side... Can I Change The Past?

And Be Dead All Along? Oh Shit.....

Tonight I Am Moving Swiftly, Even In My Pain

And I Am Missing Nothing

I Am A One Man Search, And Recollect Mission

Back, Way Back...The Way I Came In

And This Time? Maybe I'll find It...Whatever It Was

That Went Wrong

Like Being Part Of The Youngest, Least Experienced

Group Of Americans Ever To Go To War.....

Hell, Where I Came From...You Kill A Chicken? You Go To Jail

I Never Killed Anything, First Thing I Ever killed Was No Kinda Thing At All

It Was An Enemy Solider, Which Is A Hell Of Allot Easier To Say...

Then The first Thing I Ever Killed, Was A Man

I’m Moving Even Better Now, And My Guts Tell Me

In The Next Few Moments I Will Be Reunited With Myself

In That Ever Lasting Moment Of Truth

When Last My Mind , Body, Heart, And Soul Were One

Manys The Night, I've Woke Up In a Cold Sweat, Screaming In My Sleep...

In My Dreams..... I Have Relived That Night Again

And Again

And Again

With The Deep Inner Fear....That One Night....

That Patrol... Will Never End

My Grandfather never spoke
Of the Great War.
Instead he told of dancing
With French peasant girls.
Sometimes I wanted to dance
With my Grandfather,
But he had left his legs
In a foxhole in Belgium.

My Father never spoke
Of World War II.
Instead he told of
Telling stories around a campfire
On Guadalcanal.
Sometimes late at night
A dozen years later,
He would scream and writhe in pain
With the Malaria
He couldn't leave in the Pacific.

My cousin never spoke
Of the Korean Conflict.
Instead he told
Us how much our letters meant
In that cold forgotten place.
Sometimes I would like to write
To him again, but
The telegram forgot to mention
The zip code for someone killed in action.

My husband never speaks Of Vietnam,
Instead he tells me
How beautiful the flowers were.
Sometimes in July
When fireworks crack and sparkle
He cowers in a closet,
Holding his head
And calling out,"Incoming! Incoming!"

Do I speak to my children
Of wars gone and those yet to be?
I can't begin to know
The horror or the exhilaration.
I've never been there.
But sometimes I tell them
Of Peace and the price
That some have paid
For this illusive gift.

And if I never spoke
Of war?
How would they understand
About honor, courage and patriotism?
But sometimes I have to tell them
About greed, power and carelessness.
Because war isn't always what it's said to be,
And God isn't always on our side.

Again on Patrol By Preston H. Hood, III, Sanford, Maine (Seal Team Two)

I condition for night raids
running three miles around
Nha Be support base in the 114 heat.
Bravo squad thinks I've cracked,
if I ready my head before I fight.

We lift off to Chou Duc then Cambodia,
Black Berets sent to raid a POW camp,
the sharp edges of fear
slip through our fingers like rope
we snake down, cold sweat, a vertical drop.
Our heads, bounties, the Viet Cong wait in ambush for.

I repel through the door of the gunship
thinking about someone to love.

Again on patrol, I am a hunter in the blackness:
dozing off, hardened, tired of danger.
I sight the enemy, belly-wet, deep in Rungsat,
yellow muscular legs standing executioner quiet,
black-green smudge and sweat curled on lip.
A snake stops me. I wade ahead,
fall through myself like a stone--
enemy voices passing only a few meters away--
the backdrop of dark, life's death.

Speed-eyed, gut knotted in fear
I scan the horizon for movement,
count the bodies cross the canal,
wait until they slip into the mud...

My memory is a red brown blur,
a gauze for the wounded we torture.
What is happening seems not true...
All around us, screams of wounded brothers,
invade like a North Vietnamese Army.

Two hours before dawn the next day, we insert
by chopper on some Viet Cong farmer's land,
to interrogate VC sympathizers,
search for the mortar tubes the NVA shell us with.
We demand revenge on his turf:
the smell of rice at the jungle top,
lazy orange mist shifting like smoke.

In low silhouette we patrol to ambush,
our bodies surrounded by dark,
the shadow of surprise suspended in us,
like the thunder of an outlining storm.
Across the trail wind rips nipperpalm--
fear crawling at our feet--a wounded man.

During the ambush we radio in an air strike,
the wounded lie with the dying,
burning flesh smelling rank;
dragged bodies, hurried away,
disappear into branches of bamboo
where an arm and a head lie.

Along the river erratic blood trails
mark a company retreat, bombed-out bunkers abandoned,
shallow graves dug quickly,
brown-uniformed and black-pajama bodies
rice bowls and fish heads,
children half-buried in dirt.

Slowly the trail snakes left then right;
heads bob and duck through nipperpalm;
red ants bite on back, neck and arms.
We shake and brush them off with some noise
as the pointman dips behind dark shapes and disappears.
Are we close to the end?

I'm a man half in the water, half out;
my legs suck into the mud;
my arms old, my head outstretched,
hasten to deliver me among the dead.
I find an inward breaking a circumstance,
a consequence impossible to abandon
to a determined enemy--irrefutable snipers--
ghosts we were up against.

July 23rd is the first time I imagine I can die.
We'd always been cocky, but this time we ask for it.
We send out a listening post of two,
booby traps blow them up like confetti.
How absurd the ten of us taking on two hundred.

Flash! A direct hit....blackness deepening with red.
I flip through the air...in ...slow...motion
trip wire to booby trap I land inches from
Christ that was close lugging pointman
out from the canal he was blown in
mudbleedinglimbs am I OK he says
yes I say bandaging him
injecting morphine/never cut his pain
I carry him saddle back through mud and the fire of napalm.

Welcome

Welcome to my military poetry web log .

Shrapnel in the Heart

About Me

Tuesday, September 14, 2004