Where all the flowers have gone
the ought-to-have-been couple
raw and pretty to see together
gain a year’s distance
he hit her
that former wit
now well married to a war
Poems on the topic: war
Poems on the topic “war” on Poets.by.
High-value assets
insipid discourse about suffering
is dangerous
all unprepared heads must be spared
those being the best for war
it will not be safe to expose
the rich to doubt
or the poor to conviction
horrible is the death grin
they escape in fight not laughs and curses
and the things of life
Blowback
in last night’s news
who was taken by war
guns like strange teeth
carry the enemy home with us
In the Mountains of the Lion
Imagine having to go on with no way to touch.
Giving birth to the child of who knows which
stoned soldier, & never knowing the silky
feel of his skin, whether to caress
or to shove away, away.
I let him nurse to ease the swelling in my breasts.
I licked him like a cat — it was all the salt I could get.
Were they not terrible, those severed hands,
when they stood back up at last
& began to point?
From a distance
God knows how many times
I have stood frozen in the hot street
with rifles pointing at my crotch
& watched myself – small
& impossibly thin – in the oil-black
mirrors of their sunglasses.
They never take them off, not even
to enter a mosque. God knows
they are easy to hate.
But after the explosion when
I ran with the others to look, suddenly
I felt shame for all the things
I had thought. One howled, the other
bled in silence, eyes naked
to the sun. I bent down.
Above the smooth cheeks
Surgical strike
a half-hour war
from our want of discourse
ordinary as the afternoon
then home to supper
Propriety
who was not for the war
and the business of war
and whatever he pretends
means no hurt in it
a failed swan
coming home to a field
at the office I bound myself
to strict rules
Perplexed
could I understand
what I could not stand
forced to go to bed and give
the night a night
to master my mind
unfounded as a country
made for war
Keyboard warrior
where I carried a cross like a prize
where I bled ink and coffee
where it all evened out
with war for discourse
I spoke but did not see
but at night in the garden
I thought of you
Purple hearted
the war ended some other me
we were as one
in the assignment of heart
having seen the way to write
letters home
Guerrilleros
looking like people that had taken
leave of the world
we would go off to meet
the enemy towards evening
just as the great difference
between us was in doubt
Deer park
white deer
the park is troublesome
with the dust of war
Describe a feeling — we’ll find a poem
Or try: