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The Return

 

Doves knock dates on my head
As I walk under the palms
A flutter of wings as they
Fly off into the desert sky.
The west walls crumble
In front of the setting sun,
Stained pink with light
As they contain me within the prison of our own making.
My hands grow cold in the December air.
I breathe into them to warm them from the chill.
It’s quiet.
Again.
No gunfire tonight,
No explosives today.
For now, the helicopters shuttle only boredom; the cries of the wounded no longer on board.
Iraq is different now.
Not like before….

—Maj. Theodore E. Lockwood II
March 2009

 

 

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March 2023