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Critical Analysis #1
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Local Rebel
Member Ascendant
since 1999-12-21
Posts 5767
Southern Abstentia

0 posted 2000-10-23 12:56 PM


Sunday luck maybe
it wasn't like Christmas
the beach still
warm December's chill
half a planet past Tuesday

Sam was his uncle as
he was mine
     he grinned
nervous through antique lips
                leaning forward
he continued the chronicle
never told
from the refuge of a slatted
chair unfolded into the June sun
he didn't harbor any grudge
         he said

Many nephews had asked
   before
many years having passed
since that day when the morning sun
had brought the hail of fire

I thought he must have seen it
staring off into thin air
the hum of cicadas his only
trumpets of glory

Many had asked but
now he couldn't eat pie
      crusty flaky fresh
strawberries with
cream,

baby food wretched
baby food cream
corn maybe
water won't even go down
when his craw clamped

Pearl was quiet
Sunday morning silence
and a good time to crap
he laughed
the war had caught him
with his pants down
he was just a kid
then and still
he could hear a gnat fart
a half a mile away
and the buzz reverb
rattling from the tin roof of
the latrine
broke the peace
he didn't know
why
it was just different
somehow

interesting

the guns were kept standing
on the beach
I didn't fully comprehend
why but it seemed
they kept them
propped up against each other like
poles like a teepee or something

he coughed and I let my
mind drift as he described it
and the tape recorder gave me
false security I failed

to realize
it was just the din of the cicada's
heard by the built-in
microphone
I was just a kid then and
studying journalism

never told this story
until now not sure why
unless it's because
pie is off my menu
and all I want these days
is a little peace

but

he ran from the cabana
to the beach empty
except for the guns
the shadows in the sky
and the sound didn't sound
like any of Sam's aircraft

he didn't remember
maybe the first shell
fell
down spiral
the gravity of a
whistle into epidemic
bangs metal and
flesh frying
breakfast not even
on the table yet

maybe

or the alarms came
first
the swarm of soldiers
staining the white sand
with footfalls thundering
bombs hailing down
into guns the big ones
Missouri burning

He had his gun already
when the SEE-OH ordered everybody
to get their
guns
almost everybody
already
had a gun
the SEE-OH wanted them to fall

in line and march
up to the hills

on the highway

and they double timed
until the company halted
and the SEE-OH
some skinny West Point reject
with a butter bar
squeaky voiced
punk in fatigues

maybe he was still hungover
from Saturday nite
maybe

but he ordered them into the shrubs
the Hawaiian bushes
there on the side of the road
to hide, to hold
their fire
but there was too much fire
in the water

the mayhem was stoning my
uncle and maybe he
just couldn't hear orders
over bombs
the planes
the guns
the pathos of men
boys
dying on a Sunday morning
on the beach
in the water

that's what he told the officers
the ones sitting in judgement
of his trial
the court martial
the one ordered by the skinny
squeaky
lieutenant who was pissed off
because my uncle had the nerve
to disobey an order
and shot a jap plane
flying low

he said they were
so low
he thought if he'd just

stood up

up there in the hills
he could have
touched a wheel
on one of the planes
flying over like locusts

the cicadas hummed
as we listened
two of his other nephews
one of them
my uncle the other my dad
my great uncle sat there
staring off

his wife
waddling out of the kitchen
screen door springing
back slammed
the strawberry pie
fresh and sliced on
serving plates
she was carrying out for us
but it didn't seem right
for us to eat it when
he couldn't have any but

I'd come 1200 miles
and all I'd ever heard was
Aunt Mava's pie
strawberry was just about
mana from heaven and
I'd never even had the chance
to meet these people before
and he'd never told this story
to my dad or his brother
or anybody but they'd known
somewhat about it
and he just wouldn't talk about the war
but I'd only just met him
and it didn't seem right
to eat pie

The military court then called the SEE-OH
to the stand
to testify
he told them all about
how my uncle fired a shot

my uncle looked up around
at his nephews and said
he wasn't the only one

somebody else down line
fired about the same time
he did
and a jap plane went down
so he never really knew
if it was his bullet
or not
but he'd always felt like
it was

The officers stopped the prosecutor
then they asked the SEE-OH
how many men
were in the company
up there
in the hills

hiding

he gave them the number
probably the correct one
because he seemed like the
by the book wonk type

then they asked him if all the men
had

guns

and the wonky wimp
said

yes

and they asked him
if they all had ammo

and the limp prick
said

yes

one of the officers
maybe some general
I don't know
stood up and
went face to face with the wimp

chewed on his cigar
and sprayed spit
all over him as he
cursed in his face
echoing back how many guns
and how many rounds
were up there
in the hills
hiding
just

inches

away from the enemy
swarming overhead
and asked him

why?

Why did you order your men
to hold their fire
while the harbor burned?

The wimp swallowed his throat
and squeaked out
some bull**** about protocol
and not revealing positions
and procedures and such things as that

And let's say it was a General
just for the sake
of the story
had my tape turned out
I'd know today but
all I have to work from
is  my head and it's been
a long time since 1979

Sam's General turned red
holding the prosecutor
back from the stand
with his free hand
while he grasped
the SEE-OH by his
collar and began
to rant

If the SEE-OH
could have have just
seen
oh how many men
wouldn't have died
that day
because he had enough guns
enough rounds
in position
to have seriously
changed the outcome
of that December Sunday
if he'd only
just not been
too ****less
to reveal his
position

My uncle didn't hold
a grudge
against Sam
but Sam,

Sam grudged
the SEE-OH
but was always
too shy
to tell it
to the rags



Hate is a dead thing. Who of you would be a tomb? -Kahlil Gibran


© Copyright 2000 Local Rebel - All Rights Reserved
Christopher
Moderator
Member Rara Avis
since 1999-08-02
Posts 8296
Purgatorial Incarceration
1 posted 2000-10-23 06:45 PM


quote:
by the book wonk type


uhhh... what's a "wonk?"

kid D
Member
since 2000-10-18
Posts 64

2 posted 2000-10-24 10:22 AM


no critique here....just a very humbled poet saying, when she got her breath back
....awesome....you tell a story like no other  

too many spots to say my favorite, but your timing, your line breaks are great, i love the way it breaks up the rythm, but adds to the meaning  

and hey, since you didn't eat your pie...i love strawberries  ....no really i love the way you used the pie ....great writing local rebel

[This message has been edited by kid D (edited 10-24-2000).]

warmhrt
Senior Member
since 1999-12-18
Posts 1563

3 posted 2000-10-24 12:43 PM


Local Rebel,

Usually I don't care for lengthy poems (that SAP problem), but this one grabbed me. Like kid D, it would be difficult for me to say which parts were my favorites, as the entire story was so well told. I did really love that first stanza, though. Thank you for a very entertaining story, well-written.
mia

jbouder
Member Elite
since 1999-09-18
Posts 2534
Whole Sort Of Genl Mish Mash
4 posted 2000-10-24 01:49 PM


Reb:

This is a nicely told story.  I liked the fragmented effect some of your line-breaks gave the story (seemed to parallel the speaker's reconstruction of the distant memory).

There were times when longer lines would have been more appropriate than shorter lines.  My suggestion would be for you to read the poem aloud several times to get an idea of where certain linebreaks are more jarring than you originally intended.

I also have not problem with the content. I enjoy poems with historic allusions (this one obviously to the bombing of Pearl Harbor in 1941) and I think I've heard some stories that tell, roughly, what your poem tells ... of the undercurrents of conspiracy to draw the United States  into the Second World War.  I am personally not convinced of this but am cynical enough to say, "It wouldn't surprise me."  

Thanks for the read.  I enjoyed it.

Jim

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