Two Letters From Nam

I know two of them gave me
there dying messages.

I poked the wrinkled
letters into my fatigues.

The air raid came from a clear sky.
I was more dead than alive.
My eardrums burst from the blast.
My leg broken
My spirit broken.
my young days
now lay dead.

I know two of them gave me
their dying messages.

In Ohio I gave the letter
to a lady his grandmother.
She asked how he died.
Tears in her lined face.

I murmured
"We were seventeen or eighteen.
There were four or five of us
I don't remember exactly."

In West Virginia
A beautiful young woman
answered the door
she was holding a baby.
Her eyes welled with tears
as she read the bloodstained note.
She asked if it was quick.