I met Ray McNiece at a poetry reading, commemorating the Kent State Massacre of May 4, 1970, at Brady’s Cafe in Kent OH, right next to the Kent State campus. He read the first two stanzas of this poem that night. He composed the second two stanzas a year later. We went to see him perform his poetry (more performance art) several times in the  early to mid ’00s. We even got to attend a few poetry workshops with him. He’s the one who encouraged me to attempt Haiku. Thanks, Ray! –LE

Memorial – for Jessica Krocza
by Ray McNiece

War is just a word
far from these suburbs,
but not for her. Heroes,
here’s a monument for
Dow Chemical’s research team,
lab coats stained agent orange,
and Pentagon generals, orange
Nam campaign bars across chests.
Not a cold, metal-cast statue
to placate men who can’t see
faces reflected in that black wall –
just a simple, floppy girl
born under a cabbage patch
scorched by the rusty cloud
sprayed over her father’s daydreams
of home and nightmares of wave
upon wave of black pajama boys
dancing on the concertina wire
to the tune of jamming M-16s.

She’s been twitching like that
every night ever since, neurons
misfiring like the kick of sidewinder
machine gun dubbed Puff,
the magic dragon, run amok,
tearing the jungle to shreds.
But the birds perched in her shriveled
brain can still slur together
the theme song of a purple
dinosaur on TV she watches
with a cross-eyed, 1,000 mile stare
inherited from her old man
popping open another beer,
drowning in the colorful jumble
on the screen to distract death
waiting the perimeter at Khe San.

Memorial (new stanzas)

Heroes, it’s all happening again
for bright-eyed, clean cut Billy,
Gulf war vet who refused
to take the antidote for the chemical
weapon until the major ordered it
and the scuttlebutt said, we know
what they’ll throw at us since
we sold it to them in the first place.
But in the last place, Billy can’t sleep
or keep a solid stool, or rub two
thoughts together on the VA forms
even though headlines link
that pill to the syndrome
a year too late for suicide Billy,
spared Pentagon plausibles and further
tests as he joins the list of acceptable
losses on the spreadsheet.
Are the rig fires of Kuwait still burning?

No gung-ho monument can save
Billy, or this seizured girl Jessica
from stumnbling down the steps
again and breaking her arm
in the same place again.
No burst of glory raising the flag
cracked her pelvis or chipped
her teeth into that snaggled
smile. Here’s a salute, her arms
flipping rapidly when she’s happy,
thudding dully on monsooned leaves.
How many times will she fall
for our fallen heroes? Here’s a witness
who will not stand and rust.