2105 H

I’m not a pussy.

               - but my head hurts so badly, my back goddamn kills me at times – doc says it’s from that specific time that IED’d blasted my ass outta the APC and in the dirty, on my back, BAM SPLAT CRASH RATTLE and my brain been knocked around and my spine been jolted and fucked up and I ain’t no goddamn pussy I carry my fucking weight goddamnit and I work my fucking shift and I sweat without complaint and the goddamn pills make me feel like driftwood so I don’t take em and my head starts to hurtin’ so badly and my back starts to goddamn kill me and I have to stay home and stay limp and there was this kid fucking kid just in his teens just wun-ait-teen, dig? and he ain’t alive to deal with his head hurting so badly and his back goddamn killing him cause ain’t nothin’ killin’ him no more cause he’s goddamn dead, gone, baby, gone, and that’s when I’d called home called mama and ain’t said a word just breathed sighed cried wept shook into the phone and she’d just said it’s okay, honey, it’s okay, sweetheart, it’s okay . . . sweetheart, it’s okay, honey, it’s okay . . . and ain’t a word exchanged between us and I’d already lost my face and lost some of my neck and already had the rivers and ditches and trenches of scars and ain’t shed a fucking pussy ass tear until that kid got it and he’d been just damn near fresh outta high school and he ain’t never said a dirty word until this puppy we’d adopted as our platoon pet had died and I ain’t allowed him to put a cross on that puppy’s grave and he’d said I hate this fucking war and that’d been the first the only the last time I’d heard him say any goddamn vulgar thing and my head hurts so badly and my back goddamn kills me and I have to take sick time off from work and occupy my brain lest I blow it the fuck out and write this by means of occupation and remember I’d told that kid he’d get home I’d get him home he’d get home and he’d gotten home in a flag-draped coffin and here I am this worn out fucked up used up dried out sergeant yeah alright roger that uh fur muh tiv but I ain’t no fucking pussy I ain’t druggin’ myself  up cause I can take it endure it suffer it outlive it until it goes away and . . .

               I’m not a pussy.