So, after returning from a one year tour in Iraq with the United States Army Infantry and being an exceptionally poor correspondent (especially to myself), I am cozy-warm in my mother's home once again, the Christmas buzz dissipating like a morning fog to reveal the end of a decade and, for me, the end of an era. The space between the kid who just couldn't help himself and had to touch the butterfly's wings and the man who could serenade a cocoon has seen a boom in construction.
The idea of modern warfare (in terms of the technology employed and the agenda's pursued) never sat well with me. Long before I actually enlisted, it made my stomach churn to even indulge in fleeting glimpses of myself as a soldier in today's military. But I managed to fortify my will against my better judgment and in a flash impetuous self-destruction I hoisted a rag of Army colors that was frayed only at the fringes with threads of "duty, honor, loyalty" etc. and flailed lifeless in the wake of my desperate escape. Now, having come dangerously close myself to becoming what is so wrong with the military, I feel a deep sense of gratitude to have come out on the other side unscathed (at least physically) and to have another shot at an authentic and conscientious existence.
So, after being blessed by a reunion at home with my loving loved ones and, consequently, a reunion with my own soul, in the spirit of true freedom I'm raising the colors of a new year, a new decade, a new era, and I think most importantly, a new day.
Saturday, December 26, 2009
Sunday, November 8, 2009
Off The Shelf
On this night all things fall off of the shelf and gather in me to conspire. In a whirlpool of flailing voices and flaring nostrils I am spinning willingly toward a red-lined reaction. I am a combustible combo of intuition and inertia. We tell war stories to stay close and drink wine to stay warm. Is this really happening? Were we in that barren land for 11 months, sharp as a razors, heavy as a hammers?
Here we are again, so distant from who we thought we were and so close to becoming the echo of an explosion. A flash, concussion, smoke and mangled debris scattered throughout the memories of the past, reaching like a fog into the ruins of an ancient burial ground, overgrown already with weeds of indifference. Silence will tell.
Here we are again, so distant from who we thought we were and so close to becoming the echo of an explosion. A flash, concussion, smoke and mangled debris scattered throughout the memories of the past, reaching like a fog into the ruins of an ancient burial ground, overgrown already with weeds of indifference. Silence will tell.
Thursday, October 29, 2009
...and that
I don't have the time or equalibrium required to even attempt a personal analysis of this whole mess of a shit pile under which I've found myself not feeling, not comprehending, not caring. No, for that I'm waiting for a soft and unsuspecting night of drunken reflection....until then, it aint no thing.
Thursday, October 8, 2009
Hard times for nice guys
I recently (as of ten or fifteen minutes ago when one of my three roommates filled our cozy quarters with the most potent of gases, the internet crashed, I tripped on a wire heading out the door that I would be breaking in a rush of distemper, etc...) realized that one year is ample time to develope some bad habits; I mean, really blaze a path where there once was only an occasionally traveled game trail. In a moment of critical mass melt down, a flurry of obsenities followed me to the explaination provided by a fellow fumer... Iguess I went to the "pit." The pit is that place somewhere between your big and little intestinal fortitude where, in the face of promised adversity you curl up into a little ball, set the alarm (in this case, October 29th, 2009 a.m. (when we are schedualed to reenter the blossoming land of the living)) and comence Operation Functionally Catatonic/Enduring Emotional Unavailability. Needless to say, these days of realization are of a rather volitile nature...I believe the term is "hair trigger." More to come with the patience that I will no doubt need to begin cultivating.
Saturday, August 29, 2009
Monday, August 24, 2009
Stop what you're doing and be still for five minutes, focusing on your breathing. Does your heart run away in impatience or perhaps frustration...? "I can't stand when these fucking cosmic cliches tell me to be still and breathe deeply, in that voice that thinks its narrating my subconscious. Pretentious assholes." Give it a whirl and then ask yourself where you are. Are you your name in your house? Are you aware of a sense of seperation? Do you find yourself categorizing your very own identity according the bins that society has labeled for you? Are you lost without a reflection of yourself, either by negation or affirmation in the eyes and expressions of others?
Friday, August 21, 2009
The documentary "Zeitgeist" (German for "time-ghost") should be required viewing for all American citizens. We really don't ask enough questions. We are far too content with our reality, asleep under the myths that blanket our lives. Time to break through to the other side. Time to get mad and hold the real transgressors accountable. Our nation is in distress and the vast majority of its people are indifferent if not oblivious, egomaniacle if not dillusional, just plain dense if not numb, desensitized and depraved.
"WHY?" is the catalyst.
"WHY?" is the catalyst.
Monday, August 17, 2009
Saturday, August 1, 2009
Salutations from the barren lands of ancient Babylon. I'm currently engaged in an intimate staring contest with the vacuous reaches of a desert horizon taunting me with a past of biblical proportions, a present of frightening logic and a future of impossibly beautiful dreams. The parched wind whispers to my cheek its dying wish, but she's too faint to make it out... I remember her best in rushes of exhilaration as she washed over my electrified skin burning through the pre-historic ruins of Monument Valley at seventy-five m.p.h. on golden wing; like a child stepping up to the plate and staring down his major-league hero, the moments racing past in flashes of terrifying ecstasy.
Last night I was strolling through an eerily familiar landscape, obscured by a heavy blanket of sleep, with someone who I think was my mother. We came suddenly upon a rattle snake that had no rattle. I swiftly raised the shot-gun that miraculously appeared in my hand as I took the serpent in my sights and pulled the trigger. The first scatter-shot peppered it and the second was concentrated into its delicate skull. It reared back by force of the blast, hissing demonically and then whipping itself forward and sinking its fangs into itself, as if in spite. As I leaned down to inspect the heap of swelling sin it began to bloat and it flared its gut to reveal its belly covered in hair like that of a cow's. The woman who was accompanying me asked if I planed to gut and clean it at that time, but I was so stricken with fear and disgust that I replied, "No, I'll do it tomorrow." We started back in the same direction we had just come and had walked about twenty-five feet when I turned around to observe the scene. In the place of the snake was standing the grotesque figure of a man...pale as bone. He stood there as if in a trance, shaking his head in disbelief of what must have been a painful mutation. He looked at me and said very matter-of-factly, "Well, I guess I'll see you tomorrow, then."
Last night I was strolling through an eerily familiar landscape, obscured by a heavy blanket of sleep, with someone who I think was my mother. We came suddenly upon a rattle snake that had no rattle. I swiftly raised the shot-gun that miraculously appeared in my hand as I took the serpent in my sights and pulled the trigger. The first scatter-shot peppered it and the second was concentrated into its delicate skull. It reared back by force of the blast, hissing demonically and then whipping itself forward and sinking its fangs into itself, as if in spite. As I leaned down to inspect the heap of swelling sin it began to bloat and it flared its gut to reveal its belly covered in hair like that of a cow's. The woman who was accompanying me asked if I planed to gut and clean it at that time, but I was so stricken with fear and disgust that I replied, "No, I'll do it tomorrow." We started back in the same direction we had just come and had walked about twenty-five feet when I turned around to observe the scene. In the place of the snake was standing the grotesque figure of a man...pale as bone. He stood there as if in a trance, shaking his head in disbelief of what must have been a painful mutation. He looked at me and said very matter-of-factly, "Well, I guess I'll see you tomorrow, then."
Friday, July 24, 2009
Saturday, July 11, 2009
all bets are off
Looking up at the pallid moon tonight I wonder what those mischievous insurgents might be up to in the mysterious desolation outside my front gate. For as many times as I have lit a cigarette and wondered why I am here, on this earth, in Iraq, or if my purpose is as parallel with the machine as my contract says it should be, I rarely consider the simple beauty of the night sky as it is, vast and indifferent, cool and crystallizing. But such indulgences of the soul are inefficient and costly. To roll the dice with hope and love on the line is a dangerous gamble. The deeper, more searching and abstract the feeling for the sensitivity and affection of any other time and place, the higher the stakes.
Caldwell was rocketed a few days ago. It was the first time this f.o.b. has been hit in over two years. The eight foot Katusha rockets impacted a few hundred meters from where we sleep and served as a vital reminder that we are indeed in the heart of a combat zone. After June 30th U.S. troops have largely pulled out of the urban c.o.p.s and f.o.b.s and combat missions have almost halted in their tracks. We have ceased to roll out on "combat patrols" and the area that we have worked so hard to clear of insurgent activity is now entirely in the Iraqi Army's hands. In direct proportion to the diminution of our presence and Sphere of Influence, terrorist activity has increased. More IEDs and land mines on the roads that we so diligently cleared, more attacks in the cities and no doubt more plans to display the destructive and homicidal passions of religious jihad.
Our mission over these past eight months has largely been to strangle the flow of weapons and explosives trafficking from Iran into the urban hubs of terrorist activity. These supplies would be transported through an intricate network of canals and tunnels built back in the eighties during the Iraq/Iran conflict. So as we loosen our grip and a breath of new life enters this window of opportunity it would be no stretch of the imagination to foresee a spike in urban car bombings, suicide bombings, rocket and mortar attacks on isolated coalition forces, and ultimately a season of great unrest in the ancient land of Babylon.
Caldwell was rocketed a few days ago. It was the first time this f.o.b. has been hit in over two years. The eight foot Katusha rockets impacted a few hundred meters from where we sleep and served as a vital reminder that we are indeed in the heart of a combat zone. After June 30th U.S. troops have largely pulled out of the urban c.o.p.s and f.o.b.s and combat missions have almost halted in their tracks. We have ceased to roll out on "combat patrols" and the area that we have worked so hard to clear of insurgent activity is now entirely in the Iraqi Army's hands. In direct proportion to the diminution of our presence and Sphere of Influence, terrorist activity has increased. More IEDs and land mines on the roads that we so diligently cleared, more attacks in the cities and no doubt more plans to display the destructive and homicidal passions of religious jihad.
Our mission over these past eight months has largely been to strangle the flow of weapons and explosives trafficking from Iran into the urban hubs of terrorist activity. These supplies would be transported through an intricate network of canals and tunnels built back in the eighties during the Iraq/Iran conflict. So as we loosen our grip and a breath of new life enters this window of opportunity it would be no stretch of the imagination to foresee a spike in urban car bombings, suicide bombings, rocket and mortar attacks on isolated coalition forces, and ultimately a season of great unrest in the ancient land of Babylon.
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
i need a battle
A little flow from a couple of sleep-deprived tower guard shifts...
what can i say, i guess i still gotta pay
some dues for the shoes that took me so far away
from the ones that i love and the love from above
i couldn't see it was free till freedom took off the gloves
then it was the 1-2 and 10 and the doors swung wide open
down the halls they were callin me walls of the fallen were stallin me
but i kept pushin in spite of me in spite of the light of eternity
blindin my flight and burnin me
till i forgot how to listen and flooded my system
with sugar and spices and vices that glisten
till all i was missin
was a reason to keep pleasin myself in this prison
i need a battle
an 8.8 earthquake to shake and rattle
the wheels of this track leading back into the shadows
obscuring my vision by fear and division
of my self from my soul by a single discision
to follow hell down a hole through a shallow inscision
in the tip of my finger that lingered over the line
needing blood to be signed
so shorten my name and set a flame to my time
while i play my part in the game and march down the line
now i go boom, boom, boom till it fills up the room
to maximum capcity and critical mass
aint no elasticity can survive the blast
boy, you better watch your steppin
i rock a belt-fed weapon
my rage is a rhythm
and this cage is a lesson
that i'm learnin to the core
and turnin into my war
as i break down the doors
and shake down the memories
of every time i've turned away from a sign
and followed the low road alone
throwin stones with my eyes
these lies are a liability chocking the virility
out of the little bit of love in me
so these words that i'm writing
is the way that i'm fighting
to shed a little light
into my heart
and hope it
ripens
what can i say, i guess i still gotta pay
some dues for the shoes that took me so far away
from the ones that i love and the love from above
i couldn't see it was free till freedom took off the gloves
then it was the 1-2 and 10 and the doors swung wide open
down the halls they were callin me walls of the fallen were stallin me
but i kept pushin in spite of me in spite of the light of eternity
blindin my flight and burnin me
till i forgot how to listen and flooded my system
with sugar and spices and vices that glisten
till all i was missin
was a reason to keep pleasin myself in this prison
i need a battle
an 8.8 earthquake to shake and rattle
the wheels of this track leading back into the shadows
obscuring my vision by fear and division
of my self from my soul by a single discision
to follow hell down a hole through a shallow inscision
in the tip of my finger that lingered over the line
needing blood to be signed
so shorten my name and set a flame to my time
while i play my part in the game and march down the line
now i go boom, boom, boom till it fills up the room
to maximum capcity and critical mass
aint no elasticity can survive the blast
boy, you better watch your steppin
i rock a belt-fed weapon
my rage is a rhythm
and this cage is a lesson
that i'm learnin to the core
and turnin into my war
as i break down the doors
and shake down the memories
of every time i've turned away from a sign
and followed the low road alone
throwin stones with my eyes
these lies are a liability chocking the virility
out of the little bit of love in me
so these words that i'm writing
is the way that i'm fighting
to shed a little light
into my heart
and hope it
ripens
Saturday, June 6, 2009
D-Day
As our Boeing 757 flew over the beaches of Normandy 50,000 feet below, in route to our pit-stop in Germany, before continuing on to Ali Al Salem, Kuwait, I realized that it was June 6, of all days. D-Day. I tried to draw the symbolism out of it but decided to simply ponder the sacrifice made by so many men before me. It certainly put my experience in Iraq into perspective. It's really not so bad. Five more months of fun in the sun and then it's, "Adieu my torturous lover, sweet as a razor's edge... it's not you, it's me."
Currently, I am sitting in the Kuwait holding tank for transient soldiers, still with enough elbow room to remember the embrace of my last two weeks of unadulterated freedom. The depths of which I shall not attempt to plum. Suffice it to say that mowing my grandmother's lawn at dusk, drinking a glass of wine and kissing the girl of my dreams, meeting my new niece for the first time, hiking with my sisters, having coffee with my mother and simply breathing an extended sigh of relief was enough to leave my heart brimming with love and longing and impossible sorrow.
The second week of R and R becomes harder to enjoy as your return to the real world of mechanized submission grows imminent, the impending doom. It's a wave of emotion you don't fully acknowledge until it is immediately upon you, at which point your defenses are useless. The day I left, Anne was going to hang out with her friend for a fun-filled afternoon of beer consumption and varmint control (a win-win in Montana as cattle tend to break their ankles in the ground squirrel's holes and, after a few beers, the sport of it really starts to take hold of your emotions). "Have fun killing gofers," I said before I walked out the door. "Have fun killing people," she replied with a kind of sadness masked in the joke. We both laughed at the contrast. She's pretty damn funny sometimes.
Now the gavel has landed and still echos through my consciousness like a distant rolling thunder and lightning strikes of heartache that seize you without warning and hold the pit of your stomach captive in your throat. Its back to work but not all she wrote. The new diamond in my mind is re-deployment and returning finally to Germany. As bleak as the Grafenwoehr post seemed before Iraq, it's acquired a new flavor. One of sweet release and simple opportunity.
Currently, I am sitting in the Kuwait holding tank for transient soldiers, still with enough elbow room to remember the embrace of my last two weeks of unadulterated freedom. The depths of which I shall not attempt to plum. Suffice it to say that mowing my grandmother's lawn at dusk, drinking a glass of wine and kissing the girl of my dreams, meeting my new niece for the first time, hiking with my sisters, having coffee with my mother and simply breathing an extended sigh of relief was enough to leave my heart brimming with love and longing and impossible sorrow.
The second week of R and R becomes harder to enjoy as your return to the real world of mechanized submission grows imminent, the impending doom. It's a wave of emotion you don't fully acknowledge until it is immediately upon you, at which point your defenses are useless. The day I left, Anne was going to hang out with her friend for a fun-filled afternoon of beer consumption and varmint control (a win-win in Montana as cattle tend to break their ankles in the ground squirrel's holes and, after a few beers, the sport of it really starts to take hold of your emotions). "Have fun killing gofers," I said before I walked out the door. "Have fun killing people," she replied with a kind of sadness masked in the joke. We both laughed at the contrast. She's pretty damn funny sometimes.
Now the gavel has landed and still echos through my consciousness like a distant rolling thunder and lightning strikes of heartache that seize you without warning and hold the pit of your stomach captive in your throat. Its back to work but not all she wrote. The new diamond in my mind is re-deployment and returning finally to Germany. As bleak as the Grafenwoehr post seemed before Iraq, it's acquired a new flavor. One of sweet release and simple opportunity.
Monday, June 1, 2009
Grasp
You ever play a card game that revealed the 
balance of your existence? Well, my sister, Anne, and I just discovered such a "game"...or Grasp as we now call it. What you will need to get started: One regular deck of 52 cards, one nickle, a willingness to understand and, perhaps, most importantly, one, or two, bottles of wine (the quantity and quality of which is entirely up to the weight and willingness of you wallet).
Grasping for the wind...is this not what the rigid and habitual survivors consider a futile pursuit? Nonsense! Let flow the the uncertain and sumptuous vitality of experience. Let question beget question and life beget life. Bone of my bone, flesh of my flesh, fall prey to our inquisition and desire to discover! Behold, the Beauty and the Revelation....
Key:
Clubs = Family
Spades = Work
Diamonds = Money
Hearts = God/Love
Ace = Self
King = God
Queen = Soul Mate
Jack = The Variable Humor
1-9 = Degree of Measurement/Quantity
No formula here, just a simple and totally open communication within a symbolic and representational framework according to the musings of two siblings under the influence and in search of their souls. Bear with me, or bare with me.
Each player/seeker is dealt three cards. A nickle (as it is neither too rich nor meager) will be flipped or spun to determine who will be the first to show. The first card represents "Transitional Trials," and having called heads, I flip my first card....
Ace of Clubs = Family break down. Joined the Army for my self, resulting in my ultimate seclusion from the lives of my family and general disconnect from the rest of conventional society. My hand is now open to the insights of my quisling sibling. I am fair game to any and every association she might make with the Ace of Clubs. We dive into a dynamic and searching stream of consciousness to dance with the circle of life and dispel notions of a linear reality. Anne flips her first card....
7 of Clubs = Inclusive family break down. In touch with the transitional trials of each immediate family member and the symbiotic effect of each. Our father is dead and now more a part of our lives than ever before. A holy number, 7 is the measure of his influence: Divine. We all know him more intimately in his absence and feel the love and provision he embodied now that it is gone. Regret is destructive and instructional. We miss him and move on.
We step outside for a cigarette and ponder the providence of our immediately recent development, not only as card-readers, but as friends. Anne tells me things I've never known about her and I stop feeling so frustrated about returning to Iraq. There is such great meaning in everything and Anne's heart is a new treasure. We really are growing up together. The next card will represent the potential resolution of the first. We return to the table and I flip it over....
Queen of Spades = Work will be required and my soul mate and I will work together. Our union will consummate a love that heals the transition of one era to the next. A woman I love with my entire existence will require a sacrifice greater than I can give. Grace will prevail and the Holy Spirit will replace my desires. Anne flips....
9 of Spades = 3 being her nemesis number, representing uncertainty and irresolution. Hard work toward acceptance and simply being will be required. The trinity will never be grasped enough to make a representative image of God. Faith is required by the moment. 9 is also phonically "No" in German, whatever that means. Another cigarette... back to the cards and the third is the "tie down," the reinforcement of resolution. I flip my last card....
5 of Spades = More work. There are five immediate family members to whom I owe my love and understanding. To whom I am the seed of their father and husband and the brother by whom they have stood and encouraged for these 27 years. For rushing headlong into the infantry and war I've taken days of their worries on my shoulders and given them cause to fear. They understand, but to ask them to is the weight of my soul in their hearts. Forgive me. God give you peace. Anne shows her final card....
8 of Spades = Acceptance of family as a group of individuals and reality as infinite. "Time" is but a measurement that renders reality as a linear reference-point and a convenient ear-mark for masturbatory memories and masochistic indulgences. The end is as often the beginning as the beginning is the end. Embrace the vast expanse of experience and the dynamic throbbing of existence that is your life. Fight and bleed.
The "game" was over, I thought, then Anne swiped a card off of the top of the deck and flipped it over on the table between us. Up to this point, our hands had been only black and of work and family. The card was the 2 of Hearts. How beautiful, I thought. The two of us imagining and exploring God's infinite creation. The thoughts surging between us on our breath like lightning, like the Holy Spirit.
balance of your existence? Well, my sister, Anne, and I just discovered such a "game"...or Grasp as we now call it. What you will need to get started: One regular deck of 52 cards, one nickle, a willingness to understand and, perhaps, most importantly, one, or two, bottles of wine (the quantity and quality of which is entirely up to the weight and willingness of you wallet).
Grasping for the wind...is this not what the rigid and habitual survivors consider a futile pursuit? Nonsense! Let flow the the uncertain and sumptuous vitality of experience. Let question beget question and life beget life. Bone of my bone, flesh of my flesh, fall prey to our inquisition and desire to discover! Behold, the Beauty and the Revelation....
Key:
Clubs = Family
Spades = Work
Diamonds = Money
Hearts = God/Love
Ace = Self
King = God
Queen = Soul Mate
Jack = The Variable Humor
1-9 = Degree of Measurement/Quantity
No formula here, just a simple and totally open communication within a symbolic and representational framework according to the musings of two siblings under the influence and in search of their souls. Bear with me, or bare with me.
Each player/seeker is dealt three cards. A nickle (as it is neither too rich nor meager) will be flipped or spun to determine who will be the first to show. The first card represents "Transitional Trials," and having called heads, I flip my first card....
Ace of Clubs = Family break down. Joined the Army for my self, resulting in my ultimate seclusion from the lives of my family and general disconnect from the rest of conventional society. My hand is now open to the insights of my quisling sibling. I am fair game to any and every association she might make with the Ace of Clubs. We dive into a dynamic and searching stream of consciousness to dance with the circle of life and dispel notions of a linear reality. Anne flips her first card....
7 of Clubs = Inclusive family break down. In touch with the transitional trials of each immediate family member and the symbiotic effect of each. Our father is dead and now more a part of our lives than ever before. A holy number, 7 is the measure of his influence: Divine. We all know him more intimately in his absence and feel the love and provision he embodied now that it is gone. Regret is destructive and instructional. We miss him and move on.
We step outside for a cigarette and ponder the providence of our immediately recent development, not only as card-readers, but as friends. Anne tells me things I've never known about her and I stop feeling so frustrated about returning to Iraq. There is such great meaning in everything and Anne's heart is a new treasure. We really are growing up together. The next card will represent the potential resolution of the first. We return to the table and I flip it over....
Queen of Spades = Work will be required and my soul mate and I will work together. Our union will consummate a love that heals the transition of one era to the next. A woman I love with my entire existence will require a sacrifice greater than I can give. Grace will prevail and the Holy Spirit will replace my desires. Anne flips....
9 of Spades = 3 being her nemesis number, representing uncertainty and irresolution. Hard work toward acceptance and simply being will be required. The trinity will never be grasped enough to make a representative image of God. Faith is required by the moment. 9 is also phonically "No" in German, whatever that means. Another cigarette... back to the cards and the third is the "tie down," the reinforcement of resolution. I flip my last card....
5 of Spades = More work. There are five immediate family members to whom I owe my love and understanding. To whom I am the seed of their father and husband and the brother by whom they have stood and encouraged for these 27 years. For rushing headlong into the infantry and war I've taken days of their worries on my shoulders and given them cause to fear. They understand, but to ask them to is the weight of my soul in their hearts. Forgive me. God give you peace. Anne shows her final card....
8 of Spades = Acceptance of family as a group of individuals and reality as infinite. "Time" is but a measurement that renders reality as a linear reference-point and a convenient ear-mark for masturbatory memories and masochistic indulgences. The end is as often the beginning as the beginning is the end. Embrace the vast expanse of experience and the dynamic throbbing of existence that is your life. Fight and bleed.
The "game" was over, I thought, then Anne swiped a card off of the top of the deck and flipped it over on the table between us. Up to this point, our hands had been only black and of work and family. The card was the 2 of Hearts. How beautiful, I thought. The two of us imagining and exploring God's infinite creation. The thoughts surging between us on our breath like lightning, like the Holy Spirit.
Inspired by Gene Autry
I'm sick and I'm tired of your face,
Looking just like a loaded gun.
Like you robbed the grave of the setting sun
And called it the day the west was won.
This looks like goodbye, I hear my train a-comin
It feels like pulling teeth
With a back that was broken from bearing the weight
Of wings that never opened to carry you away.
It's high time you were brought in
You're wanted in every state of my mind
So put down your arms and come quietly
It's not so lost we cannot find.
Looking just like a loaded gun.
Like you robbed the grave of the setting sun
And called it the day the west was won.
This looks like goodbye, I hear my train a-comin
It feels like pulling teeth
With a back that was broken from bearing the weight
Of wings that never opened to carry you away.
It's high time you were brought in
You're wanted in every state of my mind
So put down your arms and come quietly
It's not so lost we cannot find.
Friday, May 29, 2009
R and R
Rest and Recuperation...at least that's what I think it stands for. If nothing else, the 15 days of leave from the theatre of war is a soldier's round-trip ticket to any destination in the wide world, at least any one serviced by participating airlines. Paramount in a soldier's mind, R and R is anticipated with a kind of suspended hope and restrained longing that is an undeniable source of strength in the midst of his personal parade of miseries. It is that pure and holy diamond in the mind, the slowly rising sun of salvation on the distant horizon. It is freedom ringing...so vague at first, then sweeter and clearer with every day, every mission, growing in proportion to the steady degradation of your capacity to endure the blunt trauma and monotony, until that fateful day when the river reaches the sea and all the tormented and muddy rush is diffused in a display of perfect release.
I vividly remember when my day had finally arrived (it was just 11 days ago, but the feeling is so momentous that it resonates almost with an eternal longing, touching the Edenic memory). I walked out to the front of the CHU's and smoked a final cigarette with my two closest friends, both of whom are still anticipating their R and R. "Have fun, man...now get the fuck out of here, asshole." With pleasure. As I stepped off I considered the fact that this was the first time since arriving in country that I'd walked anywhere by myself, and without a weapon. A strange sensation of suddenly meaningless muscle memory made me wonder just how effected the rest of my body and mind had become.
Around midnight, in the cooling of the desert and the reeling of my thoughts, the Chinook pulled its massive self into the air and I was officially leaving. Going home and leaving my self-imposed imprisonment and the animal of existence that it caged. Though my body was some thousand feet above Baghdad, sporadically lit and blinking, my heart was pumping blood from eternity past and beating my mind into submission to the surreal levity of my improved state of being and the infinite potential of the very swiftly approaching future....
I vividly remember when my day had finally arrived (it was just 11 days ago, but the feeling is so momentous that it resonates almost with an eternal longing, touching the Edenic memory). I walked out to the front of the CHU's and smoked a final cigarette with my two closest friends, both of whom are still anticipating their R and R. "Have fun, man...now get the fuck out of here, asshole." With pleasure. As I stepped off I considered the fact that this was the first time since arriving in country that I'd walked anywhere by myself, and without a weapon. A strange sensation of suddenly meaningless muscle memory made me wonder just how effected the rest of my body and mind had become.
Around midnight, in the cooling of the desert and the reeling of my thoughts, the Chinook pulled its massive self into the air and I was officially leaving. Going home and leaving my self-imposed imprisonment and the animal of existence that it caged. Though my body was some thousand feet above Baghdad, sporadically lit and blinking, my heart was pumping blood from eternity past and beating my mind into submission to the surreal levity of my improved state of being and the infinite potential of the very swiftly approaching future....
Saturday, February 28, 2009
war, what is it good for?
I really thought that this whole infantry gig might spur some creative exploration in the realm of the writen word...if only I could colour this experience in such a way that would reshape some common misconceptions about the life of a soldier and the war in Iraq. Alas, I've come to the conclusion that you are probably right about alot of things. Why am I here? Without chasing the rabbit down a trail of infinite regress, I can only say that I am here for my story. I am here so that one day, when I get out of the Army, I can stand on this experience and see what else is out there without it being in the way. A little college here, some travel there, add a dash of substance abuse, a few broken hearts, hell, throw in some combat and you might be on to something.
Monday, January 26, 2009
Here we are so miraculously
in an ancient and holy land
so high-speed and presumptuous,
dusting our weapons and buttressing big tobacco.
My thoughts are a perfectly formed skipping stone in my pocket
as I scan the desert horizon.
I am nameless and aware of the enemy.
I disappear behind my eyes and retract my soul.
If my name is written on brass,
it is by that name that the spirit will release me.
in an ancient and holy land
so high-speed and presumptuous,
dusting our weapons and buttressing big tobacco.
My thoughts are a perfectly formed skipping stone in my pocket
as I scan the desert horizon.
I am nameless and aware of the enemy.
I disappear behind my eyes and retract my soul.
If my name is written on brass,
it is by that name that the spirit will release me.
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