CONFESSION ZERO

"Flaws in our civilians are one thing; the failure of the Pentagon's military leaders is quite another. Those are men who know the hard consequences of war but, with few exceptions, acted timidly when their voices urgently needed to be heard. When they knew the plan was flawed, saw intelligence distorted to justify a rationale for war, or witnessed arrogant micromanagement that at times crippled the military's effectiveness, many leaders who wore the uniform chose inaction. A few of the most senior officers actually supported the logic for war.” Is there logic to war? Ask the solemn-jawed sky, may I put a hand on you? Ask a snipers swift bullet, will you warn me before you do? “You are clear to engage the building.” “We have personnel on the ground.” Ask a little boy, can war have both your legs today? Ask a little girl, may war slice your tiny arms away? Ask a grieving mother, which of your children should we take? “People are exiting the mosque.” “Do not engage...

In this land of twenty million years and Ishango Bone; the root of man in his original life, in his foremost loss, from the barren drums of home to the brimming terms of literacy, Egypt, Carthage, the Nubian Kingdom, the Great Zimbabwe, Sahel, Hutu and Tutsi now both so scorched in grief! Malawi, Kenya and of Livingston’s Victoria Falls, Lake Victoria; the Nile, its soggy trough beseech! O! Original land, you shall not go! Stay your spirit’s dancing in splendid hope's refrain! O! Children come! Stand upon on the back of eternity and pray for rain! © 2006 mrp/thepoetryman

Might I tell you about a dream I had? It won’t take long, my friend. Please, sit. Take off your coat. Have some coffee. Shall I tell you of my dream? Very well… Last night I dreamt I met an Iraqi man, his teenage daughter and nine year old son. It was almost six in the evening, in my dream. Six at night, like it is now. The light was almost taken from the sky. ...Yes. Like it is now. Yes. They wearily stepped onto the porch. I went to the door and I opened the screen and it screeched terribly, startling the boy. After a moment of awkwardness I said, Dear weary travelers you may enter this house You may eat of my food and drink of my water. Please. For in the end we are these things, or at least I believe we become them. Why not share, right? ...Come, my friends, sit. Rest your tired legs, there’ll always be plenty of time for walking. They entered and sat near one another on the couch. I served them water. This seemed to calm their nerves a bit. Mine too. What? Oh. No. I wasn’t nervous...

CHENEY: Perception, if you will, that's created because what's newsworthy is the car bomb in Baghdad. It's not all the work that went on that day in 15 other provinces in terms of making progress towards rebuilding Iraq. It was cold, unoccupied, lifeless; our emptiness traveling in sparsely armored Humvee; jarring and bitter, empty, insensible; our barrenness along side man's unraveling; fatigued, armed and dying. BUSH: Footage of children playing or shops opening and people resuming their normal lives will never be as dramatic as the footage of an IED explosion. They're capable of blowing up innocent life so it ends up on your TV show. It lifted the massive durable toward heaven, then bowed, bent and screeching, it fell. Silence- or so it seemed, a moment of solitude in a globe of explosion and volley escalating with the Arab sun. LAURA INGRAHAM:  To do a show from Iraq means to talk to the Iraqi military, to go out with the Iraqi military, to actually ha...

They lay upon the streets choking on their own. Mounds of people desolate in their being. Wait. And breathe in again. Kicked in the gut; split like lumber. This is a home. Animals have a home. Wait. And breathe in again. Boxes propped up in the rain. Empty cans rot. Feeding is done. Could they have hunger? Is it ours that they’re hungry? Wait. And breathe in again. Displaced assassination. Soul tainted by remark. Hold. The starving soul echoes back and lives in our queried gaze. Is this anyone’s “life”? Wait. And breathe in again. Shoes leaking dirt on new snow. Fingers hold paper canopy encasing country’s dishonor. This is not a life, is it? I think it is best to live. Wait. And breathe in again. Perhaps the hand will move. Will hope spring? Will death take notice of this? Will the good in man change them? Will our naked shame bow softly? Will we course this toward nurturing? Will the hope of man succumb to hunger? Will the pride of man not rip itself from within? ...

"I am a veteran of WW II, I served my country as well as my fellow Veterans. I, along with my wife, need our SS and Medicare to survive. Cutting the budget would put our lives into a great deal of hardship. We are senior aged. At Pearl Harbor I was ready and able to put my life on the line for my country. Sir, I don't believe this administration has the moral right to repay the seniors like myself with cutting our means of survival by cutting the budget." —George, NC It is not enough that you served with honor. It is not enough that you died for the cause. It is only enough that you are most willing to die over and over until death has no loss `til it finds passage through the vein of self torturing you through its very pounding How dreaded and parched is your termination? How outrageous and bloodied damp are theirs? How might we know the horror of your plight without looking deeper than the beggar’s eyes, without examining infinitely the empty corpse, ...

The tightening stroke. Patrolling the wounded ground. The shattered glass. Instability in central parts. Eerily forsaken streets of Baghdad. Awkward moment. Start again. Green Zone in desert sun. Firearms lifeless seize. Why am I here? Why war? Why couldn’t it be peace? Awkward moment. Start again. Infection of brutality. First we murdered their children, now they carry death wrapped in shrapnel. Awkward moment. Start again. Perhaps I will hug my mother. Will yearning yearn? Will hope be hopeful? Will carnage turn inward? Will the power of the sun arise? Will the sway of good prevail? Will the soul of man avoid its own demise? Awkward moment. Start again. Tightening eyes. Moving toward upon wounded ground. A distant explosion. It would be easy to turn and run. But why am I so damned afraid? Because they are Iraqi? Brown skin and eyes? I will stay and greet them. Will they wave and smile at me? Will evil have my face? © 2006 mrp/thepoetr...