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I Felt I’d Died |
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Above a battlefield far away,
My mind in black unconscious lay.
Tethered by a silver thread in heavens sky,
Hovering in God’s palm
Twixt heaven and earth am I.
Wound in a park swing then let go,
With no more hate to seek my country’s foe.
Left behind, heart and breath careening,
No longer man but only being.
An exploding mortar spun to death and fate,
Raised me to the door of heavens gate.
Spinning on a tenuous strand of life bereft,
I’m blind to “the world” I hadn’t yet left.
Hanging dangling on a silver thread,
No longer alive -- but neither dead,
Buoyed above the belligerent crowd,
Bobbing like a cork with the sky my shroud.
Floating unfettered without rhyme or reason,
Above the earth in a peaceful season,
Drifting on currents of sweet oblivion beatified,
Heedless of nirvana’s nothingness tide.
No longer am I a soldier sustaining oppression,
War weapons wielding powerful fists of suppression.
No more to remember man’s “inhumanity to man” war,
That pitiless beast of blood, guts, and gore.
Till a voice groaning below yanked me back,
From purest light to the war wolves pack,
To tired soldier faces with camouflage painted,
To hot sweaty soldiers with Nam’s blood tainted.
Who’s that groaning below? Who can it be?
Suddenly imposed on my senses I see…It’s me!
Suddenly aware it’s me down there sighing,
At the base of the silver tether, It’s me down there dying.
From the valley of the shadow
To war’s glory unfurled,
Platoon medic Bryant talked me back to “the world.”
Pulled back from the bright tunnel of light,
Now returned to fight the good fight. |
By
Gary Jacobson
Copyright 2002
Listed August
6, 2010 |
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About
Author...
In 1966-67, Gary Jacobson served with B Co
2nd/7th 1st Air Cavalry in Vietnam as a combat infantryman and is the recipient of the Purple
Heart.
Gary, who resides in Idaho writes stories he
hopes are never forgotten, perhaps compelled by
a Vietnamese legend that says, “All poets are
full of silver threads that rise inside them as
the moon grows large.” So Gary says he
writes because “It is that these silver
threads are words poking at me – I must let them
out. I must! I write for my brothers who cannot
bear to talk of what they’ve seen and to educate
those who haven’t the foggiest idea about the
effect that the horrors of war have on
boys-next-door.”
Visit Gary Jacobson's site for more information
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use this poem without the author's permission.
~~ Send your comments and/or use permission request to
Gary Jacobson. ~~ | |
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