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i could sing to you of epic heroes,
of valiant young men in war machines.
of noble battles in faraway fields,
of trojan horses and battering rams,
of tracer bullets and M16 jams.
i could sing praises for the dead
and dirges for the crippled and maimed.
i could sing “war is glory” but, alas, war is hell.
i could sing all these songs, both pro & con,
but what about afterwards,
what about when odysseus returns?
when inflation is rampant
and wars are internal--
when the hero becomes the common man-- again.
i could sing of those who'd fallen;
of those who could not cope.
to those to whom a hot shot needle
was the end of a desolate rope.
i could sing of paraplegics in shiny new chariots
who draw pity from a sensitive few,
who say the silliest things--
“with a little help & the grace of god,
he'll be as good as new!”
But what about the returning soldier,
now just another of the consumer class,
an ex-warrior deep in debt
whose latest sacrifice to the economy
was his after-breakfast cigarette.
a night-school bard on the gi bill,
“hey, if you don't use it, someone else will”
whose low-paying job barely covers the rent,
paid on thursday, by saturday spent--
who sings the song of the returned epic?
©2001, Denis Dunn
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