WAR AND MUD

what do i know of war ?

ive read Dispatches 
and the controlled crashing of 'nam pilots 
and Martha Gelhorne 
who couldnt find any nazis in Germany 1946
and Anthony Loyd
a war too far in paranoid black Chechen rubble
and
ive 
seen
the
awful transformation of a child 
in
the
Ukraine in Come And See

ive seen the photographs of Errol Flynn Jr
disappeared 
on 
a 
motorbike 
over the Laos border 
ive read Cats Cradle
and the solution to wars worse obstruction - mud
mud
mud
mud
wading thru mud with a canteen of gin
in the South Pacific's estranged islands

i 
know 
about 
Kovacs
and
Macnamara's Plan B
i 
know 
about 
the 
elephants declared enemy combatants
and
the
pilots who never talk about it ever - never ever ever
and 
all
the 
irish 
nurses
say 
LET MEN HAVE THEIR WARS 
BUT 
CANT THEY LEAVE THE CHILDREN OUT OF IT ?

i know some never get over the dark
and 
some 
never 
eat 
pork
again
the pigs you see - the pigs left behind
by
running 
farmers
well the pigs - they cleared up
the
battle 
fields
with
awful hungry blameless snouts . . .



ive read the trench poetry
mud
again
always mud
deepened by tears
and
i
been in memorial museums packed with shoes
and
tiny
torn
purses
and i read the lists of names in stone
wondering who died sleeping under a tank
that 
sank 
slowly 
in 
the 
mud
just to get a night out of the rain

its
all 
LEST WE FORGET - like we could !
with
Hitler 24-7 on freeview channels

and
Kissinger still alive 
and
working