War is Removed

War is removed.
I speak no evil, hear no evil, see no evil.
I speak evil...but do I SPEAK it?
I don't speak the lies, I don't speak profanity.
I hear evil...but do I HEAR it?
I don't hear the napalm, I don't hear crying.
I see evil...but do I SEE it?
I don't see the gore, I don't see the destruction.
War may be a carnival ride--
on top of the world adrenaline-
the depths of hell with anxiety.
It could make you cry with merriment,
or just plain old cry.
It could-
I wouldn't know.
War doesn't make me feel it in my gut.
I see gore in my second-cousis' eyes.
In his wholehearted allegiance to the flag.
He's sixty.
I'm sixteen.
I talk to him once a year at a family reunion in a peaceful cornfield in Illinois,
the closest thing to war is hearing about meeting his old buddies at conventions, catching up over a drink or two.
War is community, then?
They share the weight of memory (although they laugh)?
They carry each other, the wounded and weak?
They laugh, but they're wounded and weak.
They sit in a peaceful field, but they're wounded and weak.
They laugh, but they're wounded and weak?
They sit in a peaceful field, but they're wounded and weak?
They could-
I wouldn't know.