The chirp of a cricket in the still of the Southern night
takes me back there
The whoosh of the rockets on the Fourth of July
takes me back there
The flash of a muzzle on the screen in my den
takes me back there
And the soft hair on the back of her neck,
her eyes peering into mine,
her sigh in the stillness of night
Brings my guilt for having survived there.
I spend a lot of my reality there
knee deep in an ancient stinking jungle.
Inside the rotting corpse of the experiences
of a child forced into a man’s life
too soon.
Half of me is there in the firefight even now,
lying dead next to my buddies.
Half of me is here with you
In an angry empty shell.
I want to feel better or not so awful
I want to be able to feel whole
I need to honor those I left there
To live as they would have me live.
I’m too proud, I can’t let you know my reality yet
But today I need someone with me
Someone to hear the things that haunt me
Someone to tell me what is real and what is not
Someone to walk with me on my lonely march
Some one to hold my child’s shivering naked wounded soul
and tell me the old sweet lie; it will be all right.
Dave Seward
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