I don't even know if this got out during the great Yesterday Malaise,
not much matter whether it inspires response, just a thing I needed to
do for myself. A few changes beyond correcting the spelling of Pvt.
English's first name. As noted in what probably did not make it out,
the earlier version of this poem (some time during the early summer)
horrified someone who refused to even consider it. It is remarkable to
me that when a subject is as intense as Pvt. England's conduct, all
presumed "objectivity" vanishes and the dancer becomes the dance. I'm
not the dancer, I'm Balanchine:-).
ken
LYNNDIE ENGLAND TO HER BABY SON
(after a New York Times photograph)
I can't quite look I have to
shift my eyes
everyone will think it's
because I don't give a shit
how about guilt? That do you?
But what have I done to this child
what have I done to this child
made him
without a second thought
without a thought could believe
that coming even for a few seconds
was invulnerability
even inside this goddamned prison
I wanted Graner lying married bastard
I should have settled
for a gag-gift vibrator or a cucumber
I was bored
he talked to me like I was
pretty instead of a Cabbage Patch doll
only thing we did in that place
was screw with military precision
"C'mere Lynndie we have three minutes!"
precise double-time
child that should not have been born
to grow up with grandparents
live to hate his father
hate me
hawk phlegm: Happy Mother's Day every year
"Where's your mom and dad?"
"Doing time in Federal prison
for torturing towelheads."
Am I smart enough to say
"I vas honlee vollowing orderz!"
and do the Sieg Heil salute?
No, the asshole writing this is putting words
in my mouth but he's teaching me
something.
When I look at the child maybe I dream
of the Ft. Bragg vet
a phenobarbital overdose spare my son
the misery of carelessness
the misery made by this goddamn boredom
the misery made of this fear fear fear
spare him my and his father's names
Go ahead, shits. Think me a monster
for holding the fleeting thought that our son
might be a doggie sacrifice
no future but as Lynndie England's whelp
on PTS day at the dog pound.
No.
Maybe there is a forgetting.
Perhaps a forgiving.
You will look into the plainness of my face
deadness of my eyes
I will not tell you.
KTW/9-28-05
--
Kenneth Wolman
Proposal Development Department
Room SW334
Sarnoff Corporation
609-734-2538
|