Jon Forrest Glade


 

Jon Forrest Glade, a native of Wyoming, spent four-and-a-half months as a pointman with the 101st Airborne in and around the A Shau Valley in 1969, a few weeks in an open ward at Camp Oji in Tokyo, and eight months at Fitzsimons Army Hospital in Denver Colorado. He took the path of least resistance on returning to college part-time in 1986, and majored in English receiving a B.A. from the University of Wyoming, and an MFA from Eastern Washington University. He is looking for honest work, but willing to teach. He is the only representative for Wyoming in a New Geography of Poets (University of Arkansas Press, 1992).

 

THE DARK SIDE OF THE MOON

(A Shau Valley, July 20, 1969)

 

I sat in a foxhole, listening
to an announcer on Armed Forces Network
say, "Radio waves cannot pass
through the bulk of the moon.
Houston has lost contact.
The next message from space
will be in eighteen minutes.
While we wait for the space craft,
here's some more rock 'n' roll."

I took the plug out of my ear
and turned the transistor off.
If you don't pay attention on guard,
Charlie just might slit your throat,
cut off your dick
and stuff it in your mouth.

I sat there and scanned the shadows
in my sector-of-fire,
waiting until I could hear the news
about mankind's
first glimpse
of the moon's dark side.


THE WEIGHT OF THE SHEETS

Almost bought a machete
from the surplus store,
but its hilt fit my hand
just a little too well,
and old memories broke through barriers
that were disappointingly thin;
I was back in the jungles
of the 'Nam, once again.
I felt the Asian sun
on the back of my neck,
as the temperature rose
and I started to sweat.
So I slid the blade
back in its sheath,
and went to drink
in a bar down the street.
There are no guns in my house
and no tricks up my sleeve;
I'm all over that now
I claim I believe
but my wife says I curse
and cry and talk in my sleep.
And I know for a fact
that sometimes my scars
cannot bear
the weight of the sheets.


BLOOD TRAIL

I had a man in my sights
and I pulled the trigger.
I knew he would fall,
but I didn't think
he would get back up
and run like a wounded deer.

We followed the blood trail
and found only an abandoned pack.
The Lieutenant grabbed the cash,
the men divided the food,
intelligence was sent the love letters
and I took the credit
for a probable kill.
Intelligence reported the letters
were from a woman in the southern provinces.
Which meant she was arrested,
beaten, raped, locked in a tiger cage,
forced to eat her own excrement
and beaten again.

If she confessed, she was executed.
If she refused to confess, she was executed.
It was a funny war.
I shot a man.
I killed a woman.


CARD TRICKS

The dreams never change.
Death wheels out on a unicycle,
performs a handstand on its seat,
then rides through a flaming hoop.
He stands in a blue spotlight,
takes a bow to tumultuous applause.

He throws wide his shroud,
reaches between the ribs
where the heart would be
and removes an egg.
He cracks the shell,
and a dazed bat blinks in the light,
flies in a circle above the stage
and disappears into the wings.
The crowd goes wild.

death walks into the audience
and stops in front of me.
he rolls up his sleeves,
reveals the bones of wrists,
and tells me to pick a card.
Any card.