War is Hell
War is Hell
Love is redemptive.
I pray to extend more love
to each and everyone,
especially to the tired old men
who chew on their nails
and sit alone drinking spirits,
while still battling those voices
from deep within the past.
I'm haunted and broken
because the fathers and uncles
and even the grandfathers
raising my generation
were haunted and broken,
robbed of their innocence
by the wars they fought.
I grew up with these broken souls
wandering the streets of my city,
often stopping to watch them
show their misery to passing traffic
while swaying in a chemical haze.
Some of us lived in homes
along with these shadow men,
yet we all knew them well
because of their shadowy faces.
Why they didn't frighten me
I don't know for certain.
But now they're mostly gone
or patched up just enough
to live in civilized company.
The wounds yet remain
and we all carry them heavily
upon our hearts and minds,
well-aware no Rambo movie
or satin yellow ribbons,
no increase to the VA budget
or flags plastered everywhere,
will restore what has been lost
for my jaded generation and
all the generations to come.
Will we ever feel safe and alive
within our own skin?
I am tired and sick of war.
Its glory is all moonshine.
It is only those who have neither fired a shot
nor heard the shrieks and groans of the wounded
who cry aloud for blood,
for vengeance, for desolation.
War is hell.
~ William Tecumseh Sherman
