these are always great fun Joe
KS
On 23/09/2007, joe green <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> On This Day I Approach MY 59th Year--
> A Ballade
>
> The Vietnam war was goin' on
> And I was at Fort Hood
> Sometimes feeling pretty sad.
> Most times pretty good.
>
> I'll sing of soldiers in the rain
> And how its sometimes pretty hard
> And tell you how it was so strange
> On Tank Destroyer Boulevard.
>
> I reported to the Orderly Room
> To good old Major Moore.
> Who said to me "Goddammit, son
> Why don't you close the door?
>
> I about faced and about faced
> The Major Moore put on his hat.
> Said "Sergeant Green, I'm leaving now
> Don't let out the cat."
>
> I stood there in amazement
> He said, "That damn cat talks Latin."
> He's ugly, mean and crazy
> And his name in General Patton."
>
> Now, I know the General Reader
> Will cry out sans belief.
> But Major Moore strode out that door
> With his secret grief.
>
> He had just returned from Vietnam
> And was thinking "Fuck the Army."
> And he was not the only one.
> All of us were barmy.
>
> Major Moore went out the door
> To his Buddha garden.
> The Buddha looted from Saigon
> When Major Moore was parting'.
>
> He had two guys assigned just there
> To care for the flowers and trees.
> You don't believe me? I don't care.
> This was the Seventies.
>
> I went back to the Orderly Room
> Right up to the company clerk.
> "Jesus Christ what is my doom?
> Where do I go for work?"
>
> The company clerk stopped typing.
> Said, "Here take a look at this."
> It was a novel he was writing
> Entitled: "The Last Kiss."
>
> "It's set in 1984
> When everyone is dead
> Except for a boy and his little dog."
> That's really what he said.
>
> He look at me inquiringly
> As he adjusted his toupee.
> He was a Mormon and a novelist
> And, quite bitterly, was gay.
>
> And he played fine jazz piano
> In a melancholy way.
>
> I read the page and looked at him
> And pronounced the writing fine.
> He perked right up. Said, "My name is Jim.
> Do you really like the final line?"
>
> I looked at Jim quite closely
> And felt that I had no choice.
> And said in a voice quite ghostly
> "It makes me think of Joyce."
>
> The I picked up my duffel bag
> And headed out the door
> And I seemed to hear a Joplin rag
> As I saw who I stood before.
>
> It was Sergeant Major Gilmore Davis
> Who said, "Boy, put down your gear
> And go back and get a pair of pliers
> And bring them over here."
>
> Sergeant Major Gilmore Davis!
> In his Gilmore Davis way
> Had a face like "Jesus Save Us!"
> But a smile like Sugar Ray.
>
> Last days in Army service
> He's been in since '44.
> And you'll think he might be nervous
> With all the shit he did endure.
>
> World War Two and then Korea
> Three tours of Vietnam
> But you have the wrong idea
> He was mellow. He was calm.
>
> He took the pliers. Said, "Come with me."
> We went to the Rec room.
> Where he adjusted the TV
> Until Nat Cole began to croon.
>
> "Stay here, boy" he said to me.
> But he didn't mean it meanly.
> "After Andy Williams.
> We'll watch "I Dream of Jeannie."
>
> I went out into the Fort Hood night
> With my gear upon my shoulder.
> Humming "Mama, It's Alright"
> I had a chance of getting older.
>
> I was there near the Second Armor
> And the First Cavalry.
> A screw-up in a lost brigade
> In a Lost Company.
>
> The Cobras shivered above us.
> The tanks drove down the road.
> And left us alone. God loved us.
> Just like he loved Tom Joad.
>
> I got assigned to language school
> To that strange faculty
> Or draftees, drunks and derelicts
> Teaching deportees:
>
> Wives brought back to the USA
> From Korea and Vietnam
> From little villes and long lost hills
> From Seoul and from Saigon.
>
> So they could work in restaurants
> Or dance in topless clubs
> And smoke opium in trailers
> And give those fine "back rubs."
>
> One day Captain Thomas
> Came looking for his wife.
> "Where's that gook bitch? I'll kill her!"
> Then he took his life.
>
> And she got all of his insurance.
> She had quite a business sense.
> And opened up a pawnshop
> With Sergeant Gilkey, hence
>
> Her marriage to the Sergeant
> Which followed hard upon
> The orders Sergeant Gilkey
> Got to go to Vietnam.
>
> And when he was listed missing
> And then he turned up dead
> She said "I was always lucky lucky."
> And then was quickly wed
>
> To the guy across the street
> Who had the Army Surplus store.
> If you don't find that just and meet
> It's what this country's for.
>
> She was in my English class
> Before these sad events.
> It was time for her to give a speech
> And she seemed somewhat tense.
>
> "I was at the movie.
> On Tet. We in Saigon.
> Big noise. Scream everywhere.
> Go up a big bomb.
>
> Kill everyone. My mother!
> My mother, my sister died."
> She looked at me and then sat down
> And never never cried.
>
> And I remember young John Kostovich.
> He was from Chicago.
> He had a Ford Econo--Hippie van
> With the usual strange cargo.
>
> On one side was the Peace Sign.
> On the other side a frog
> And underneath that was the line
> "Onward through the Fog!"
>
> He drove that van to Mexico
> And came back with some grass.
> He told me "Joe, I wanted to just go.
> They all can kiss my ass."
>
> And I remember him a year from then.
> On the phone. I heard him scream.
> "My brother got killed in Fucking "Nam."
> It all seems like a dream.
>
> He ran right out. Got in the van.
> Screaming all the way.
> Jim Linden said to me
> "Do you think he'll be ok?"
>
> He got a "compassionate discharge."
> And then in 71.
> I got a letter. "I'm living large.
> Up here in Oregon."
>
> The real war was still going on.
> Sergeant Davis said "You losers.
> Grab your packs and get you guns.
> We're going on maneuvers."
>
> I was in charge of our two squads.
> Prayed "God, I thee implorest.
> Enlighten all the little gods
> To get us lost inside the forest."
>
> I told my guys. "We'll need a lot of beer
> For this goddamn fake war
> And guitars and books and a lot of grass.
> What are you waiting for?"
>
> So we drove off in our Army truck
> And I did not feel bereft.
> Said "Damn, I can't believe our luck."
> They turned right... then we turned left.
>
> The real war was still going on.
> The fake war did not alarm us.
> I lounged outside in the Texas sun
> In my Grateful Dead pajamas.
>
> I had brought along "Ulysses."
> Joyce was always such a charmer.
> But I lounged outside in that Texas breeze
> Reading Philip Jose Farmer.
>
> And that night Tom played his guitar.
> Beneath the Texas moon.
> So far away from the real war.
> "Lay Down Your Weary Tune."
>
> "Lay down your weary tune, lay down,
> Lay down the song you strum,
> And rest yourself 'neath the strength of strings
> No voice can hope to hum."
>
> Thirty years ago and more.
> Some are dead. All to me are gone so long.
> What in hell was all that for?
> I end this weary song.
>
> "Lay down your weary tune, lay down,
> Lay down the song you strum,
> And rest yourself 'neath the strength of strings
> No voice can hope to hum."
>
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> ---------------------------------
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