A Bitter Anti-War Poem

There on CNN was my former teacher-graduate assistant
All serious, an academic wake manager,
Praising Eisenhower and Churchill and DeGaulle,
Praising Bradley, and Montgomery.

They were, he intimated,
All within range of the liquor cabinet
And the humidor.

Meanwhile, waiting in the landing crafts
The soldiers uniformly soiled their pants
In fear of violent death.

And the boys from Bedford, Virginia,
Would never know the expensive carpet
In the London headquarters
Where the humidor was kept,
Humid and nice.

Eisenhower and graduate assistant knew the carpet,
Knew the exact number of steps
Needed to reach the door to the humidor,
Knew the combination to the humidor lock,
Knew the West Point passwords, the secret handclasp.

The secret handclasp
Was not exactly a handshake, not exactly an erotic touch.
It was something cultic, reserved for the very fascist.

"Let's send in the green ones," Ike had said.
He could have said:
"The seasoned ones, the ones sobered by combat, know better,
Know that there is a peculiar humanizing stench
Accompanying the matched spilling
Of lower and upper intestine."

James Bolner, Sr. Copyright 1999.