William McCue



VIETNAM BATTLEFIELD
 
A blood maroon canopy of clouds
Looms over smoldering charcoal fields
Where skeletal remains
Lie entangled on the ground

Bleach white bones
Are scattered in the jungle foliage
Fragments of incinerated soldiers
A corporal from Wyoming and his M16 rifle
A rice farmer's bayonet and bamboo cover

Former football stars, teachers, mercenaries
All too dangerously close to the incoming fire
And stripped of identity and nation

Dog tags and steel pot helmets
A Special Forces Bonnie hat

A voice in the crackling static
Sent an order over the airwaves
Received and confirmed inside the cockpit

A button is pressed and
Uniforms, grenade launcher and flesh
Are melted by orange and jagged
Diagonal lightning strikes spewed by
olive drab metallic birds of prey
Onto the battlefield
And inside the flash point, the dance ends
Freezing the embrace
Of hand-to-hand combat.

A gasoline smell rises and
Mixes with vapor trails
Leaving only the sound of crackling embers
And the smell of jungle foliage burning
Like funeral pyre kindling.

All that remains is shimmering heat
and the buzz of a chopper
Circling like carrion
Commanding officer on board
Reports on the aftermath
He calls off the med evac squad
No survivors to report in the wake.





William McCue is a lifelong New Yorker who lives in Park Slope, Brooklyn, NY. By day he is a senior account supervisor at Dukas Public Relations in New York City. By night he is the lead singer in the psychedelic rock cover band The Marvin Barnes Time Machine. He's also been known to pour a tasty pint of Guinness when bartending at The Gate bar in Park Slope.








                                    

 

Home
Current Issue
Submissions
Contributors' Notes


Email this poem Printer friendly page

A CLOSER LOOK: Eric Pankey

Franz Baskett

Kate Bernadette Benedict

Bruce Bennett

Ben Berman

George Bishop

Sheila Black

Ronda Broatch

Jeremy Byars

Ann Cale

Roxana Cazan

Norma Chapman

Nancy Kenney Connolly

Barbara Crooker

Michael C. Davis

Sarah DeCorla-Souza

Roberta Feins

Nan Fry

Martin Galvin

Vanessa Gebbie

Brian Gilmore

Howard Good

John Grey

Brenda Mann Hammack

Colleen S. Harris

Joy Helsing

Nellie Hill

Melanie Houle

Michael Hutchison

Jason Irwin

Lisa Kosow

Frederick Lord

Dan Masterson

William McCue

Claire McGoff

John Milbury-Steen

Anna Mills

Roger Mitchell

Barbara J. Orton

Richard Peabody

Steven Pelcman

Patric Pepper

Allan Peterson

Gretchen Primack

Oliver Rice

Margaret A. Robinson

Janice D. Soderling

John Solensten

Joseph Somoza

Sandra Staas

Micah Stack

Susan Stiles

Jennifer Sullivan

Colette Thomas

Barbara M. White

Kathi Wolfe

Ernie Wormwood

More

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

       

 

 

 

 

 


Last Updated: Feb 22, 2020 - 12:30:13 PM

Copyright 2005 - 2020 Cook Communication.