Richard
served in the U.S. Army Signal Corps, 1st Signal Bri
gade,
207th Signal Company, and was assigned to 9th Log Command
and StratCom while stationed at Phu Mu, Thailand ('65 -'66). Richard went to
Viet Nam in ‘68 as a civilian. He worked as a documentation specialist and a
communications technician (Vung Chua Mt. and Qui Nhon) for Page Communication
Engineers. After 16 months in country, he was reassigned to JUSMAC, Bangkok.
Richard lives with his wife Noy in Silver Spring, Maryland and is co-host of the
Memorial Day Writers’ Project.
DEROS
i can not come
back
this face is
empty
the reflection
you see
is not
me.
you must tell
me
who you want me
to be
this world is
not right
this is not
the way
i planned
DEROS*: Date
Estimated Return from OverSeas.
Many thoughts
that remain unspoken.
Slowly I get to
them, one at a time,
like an
assemblage of snakes, intertwined.
There is only
so much room inside.
One at a time
I give them
freedom; a chance
to escape, a path to a
less crowded space.
Tug on a
slithery end and it turns
quickly to a random flash,
an image stored
too long in a damp,
dark cave; the flesh of a soldier
torn inside out, innocent lives
too young
snuffed out.
Don’t focus too long.
Let it pass—but
inside out
it comes again and again.
Like my
life—let it pass.
a small boy
herding water buffalo
home for the
night;
stark white ao
dai*
waving in the
wind;
pristine
beaches,
not a sole in
sight;
a prop-driven
dive bomber
flying beneath
a double rainbow;
I saw fires in
Cholon– rubble,
my friend’s
home– gone.
(My first trip
to Can Tho, Viet Nam)
Perched like a
red-tailed hawk on top a fuel drum
with a warm
beer in my hand and my friend Mary Jane,
I gaze past the
watch tower where the ground
gives way to
stinking muck, brown and green.
As I watch an
orange sun sink into the South China Sea,
layers of
clouds change to purpled gray. A voice
in the watch
tower calmly proclaims:
Charlie's
coming.
A show begins
with geese alarm and panic shouts.
Pop. Pop.
Parachute flares sets the stage.
A voice
complains: Where is he? I don’t see em.
A Cobra comes
on line and lowers its head
to hurl streams
of tracers red and green.
Not ten yards
to my left two soldiers stand
in the open,
their back toward me.
They spew long
dripping arcs of leaking
red death into
a once proud sea
of tall yellow
and green.
I'm covered in
thick red dust.
There’s an
empty beer in my hand.
There’s barf on
my boots
and all over
the ground.
I try to
contain my laughter at the unfolding scene.
It's poorly
organized.
There's too
much color.
There's too
much sound.
Players scurry
like chickens and crows.
Ghost-like
figures dressed in black
snake through
the razor wire
like lemmings
heading for the sea.
I see his
eyes. He's looking
at me. I'm a
red-tailed hawk.
I sit in the
fleeting light.
I watch the
purpled-gray rise
above the South
China Sea.
Can Tho, Viet
Nam 1968
(At the Viet
Nam Veterans Memorial)
it’s dusk
how quick the
sun fades
no one is here
except me
and fifty eight
thousand
two hundred and
nineteen
as if that
isn’t enough
i know there’s
more
too many to
count
but how else
do you keep
score
shhhhhhh!
can you feel
it?
all you gotta
do is let go
well i'm tired
of being numb
tired of being
dead inside
and not knowing
why
i never touched
the wall
don’t deserve
to
still afraid to
let 'em go
my bones are
stiff
getting cold
getting old
consoled by
two-dollar wine
a hulking
shadow staggers by
i heard him
mumble:
"it don’t mean
nothing
they throw them
lives away"
Washington DC,
1997
Poets Pages
Richard
served in the U.S. Army Signal Corps, 1st Signal Bri
gade,
207th Signal Company, and was assigned to 9th Log Command
and StratCom while stationed at Phu Mu, Thailand ('65 -'66). Richard went to
Viet Nam in ‘68 as a civilian. He worked as a documentation specialist and a
communications technician (Vung Chua Mt. and Qui Nhon) for Page Communication
Engineers. After 16 months in country, he was reassigned to JUSMAC, Bangkok.
Richard lives with his wife Noy in Silver Spring, Maryland and is co-host of the
Memorial Day Writers’ Project.