An Honorable Death

The city is on fire
Speaking in the tongues of mortar shell explosions like
     the strong but soft voice from a burning bush
Pillars of salt
Pillars of smoke
Black columns ethereal snake skin twisting their hidden heads in the clouds
Distance and desert and the hell of rock and stone
The scorpion bastard
The empty palaces of sand princes
Mosaic tiles of a multi-colored Muhammad in the lavish
     corridors murals
          and dust angels dancing in the sun
               as we crack those empty ghost-less tombs
Cutler in his thick-rimmed issue prescription glasses
     blue smoke falling heavy from his puffy lips
Smiling and passing the fag
A row of sand-brown helmets and a moment of
     rest
I keep Chora in my pocket where her half-naked Polaroid
     is near enough to the body part that misses her most
A minaret in the courtyard
Black helicopters low overhead like a loose bowling ball bouncing in your
     chest

I
am
a reluctant Moses
Older than these boys
     and fearless in a way they cannot understand
          because I have lived a life and they have not
Because they dream of Tennessee hills
Because they dream of fast cars
     with engines
          and stoplights waiting for green
Because they dream of parents and
     brothers and
          sisters they aren’t quite sure how to be separated from
Because they dream of city lights and taxi cabs and hustling
Because they dream of swimming pools and not these
     dried ceramic remnants of Jihadist get-togethers
Because they dream of fishing trips
Because they dream of roller coasters
     and movie houses and
          popcorn in the mircowave
Because they dream of dad’s textile company and
     the position he’s reserved waiting for them
Because they dream of wedding rings and a husband’s
     never-ending comfortable obligations
Because they dream of the seed within them
     with an eager desire to multiply and inherit the
          earth
Because they dream of colors other than the browns of this
     land
Because they dream of hunting deer instead of men
Because they dream of not being the hunted

Where
as I
I only dream of war
And the taste of it
And the sound of it
And the death
So like Moses
     disinterested but responsible
          I shoulder my rifle and am a rock for the children of men
I will wrestle with the serpent
I will displace the angel’s hip
I will silence the lions
And
     I will be the first to push my spear
          under our Savior’s ribs to pierce his broken heart
For when they cannot face their trials
These boys
They look into my face
And I
     into the horror
War is blood and water
Forgive them, Lord, for they know not what they do.

10.10.2013

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