Cookouts

Cookouts

At first, I didn’t care about the chatter
     The neighbors made
Each outing that we attended was fatter
Than previous cookouts by the cool glade
And talk of war came and went in small spurts
Like bleeding cuts before clotting takes place
I casually listened through a beer-fog haze
As genteel hostesses served desserts-
Cakes iced with crystallized glace
Separate iceberg towers, a floating maze

      Of sweet and tart
Like a soldier’s final goodbye before
Leaving; tears wrenching the sad, sad heart.
A mother’s sorrow as she ponders war
How different these outings have become
Since the time that we first gathered-
Like wakes, celebrations of sadness
With friends hearing death’s distant war drum;
Anxious gatherings, times to console the lost herd
And listen as the wind howls with madness,

     Bleakly portends
Intractable, agonizing dull pain
A sentence indeterminate, without end
A thunderstorm’s dark deluge of rain.
As moms whisper fears and dads banter pride
Of sons that serve, the apples of their eyes
War stories trail through the barbecue’s smoke
Of uncles, granddads, battles of those who’ve died
For freedom’s sake; revealed death tells no lies
As dying coals turn to ash and memories evoke

     New memories
Fresh stories, newly messaged internet chat
From computer-savvy soldiers in armories
The children, new-age warriors in combat
Tied by digital umbilical cords
Speak of roadside bombs, maiming and death
Instant home messages of love and fear
The cookout conversation in the orchards
Of the cool glade, murmurs beneath the breath
As kinfolk pray and shed silent, soft tears

     Small watersheds
Ridges of love, separate the rivers
Of care between these kin and the blind heads
Of state; delineate takers from givers
Highly seasoned, the lamb roasts over the spit
Waiting for the hungry wolves to satiate
Near the flames of the flickering campfire
Like suicide bombers gorging holy writ
From fiery mosques as Imams castigate
The desecration of golden dome spire

     Our mutters pause
As frail soldiers join the somber picnic fray
Limbless heroes haunted by war’s cause
Pale amputees silence our deep dismay
Their condition immutable, fixed
Awkward small talk unties our tongues
Opens our hearts, prompts forced smiles
From grieving mothers, emotions mixed
Like Bloody Marys soaking blurry sons
Stupor dulls the senses and the guiles

     New news arrives
Along morning- flickered television screens
Like Kurdish ponies in view at sunrise
Peering over Zagros craggy scenes.
Cruel Baghdad carnage befalls the masses
Who worship in ancient holy shrines
Echoing” allahu akbar” God is Great!
Chest-pounding protesters riding asses
Who’d sell their souls for two thin dimes
Spew “Death to America”, while full of hate

     Fox News reports
Fresh causalities casually, as if
The passing of an acquaintance exports
The same as the death of a young soldier
Imploded on hostile roads by terrorist’s bombs,
Vaporized in thin air, meshing nightmare
With reality. Benumbed tears wet the cookout fire
Rising smoke etches faces through the palm fronds
Images of small children swirl in the air-
Heavenly spirits soaring above a funeral pyre

     They remind us
As flag-draped coffins remind us
To shrivel when politicians make a fuss
With highfaluting words to inflame the lust
Of meaningless passion, for commerce sake,
When good old boys in prayer breakfasts prompt
Pre-emptive strikes to” root em” out of hiding
With bunker busters to” make em shake and bake”
Like dancing rag heads whose lives we pre-empt;
When genteel women with broken spirits arise

     In concerto
One voice, a voice of peace, of war
A voice echoing like a defeated Roberto
Duran,“No mas, No mas”, No more, No more,
The mother’s doleful cries heard by the score
Across the land, in cities great and small
As smoke from protest charcoal- fires sear
The loins of a Crawford Texas beef carnivore
I thirst for bygone days, but above all
Our children see the light of a new year