a welcome home

as the hypocrite talking head
seeking re-election in 2012
tells us all that this empire (which continues to wield its
sledge hammer upon the world)
this “land of the free”
(who demands that all others follow in its
dirty
&
bloody
footsteps),
is one which “unlike the old empires,”
does not force its will upon the people of this planet
“for territory or resources,”
a soldier watching
shoves their finger down their throat
forcing themselves to vomit up the
utterly visceral disgust
which accompanies the knowledge that
s/he has taken part in making Iraq
american.

the soldier is coming home to a country
whose chose the spending of money on
bashing Afghanistan & Iraq
to be more important than providing employment,
universal healthcare,
affordable housing or
a decent education system
to its own citizens---
instead we have taken pleasure in killing those abroad
so that they will be forced to be like us---
so that one day they can have
skyrocketing unemployment,
no health care,
no affordable housing or
a decent education system
either
(that is, if they don’t already reside in such a state as a
product of our entrance & extraction of all their
resources for use within our borders).

the soldier knows many of the 4,500 who died
in bashing Iraq,
the soldier may be one of the 32,000 who have been wounded,
or s/he may know any number of these individuals
who for 9 years spent their time
killing the 104,000 (estimated by Iraqis)
or perhaps 600,000 (Lancet estimate)
or perhaps even more civilians than that,
as estimates of over a million
come to light through further studies,
not to mention the deaths caused by the
strangling sanctions which the empire administered upon the
country
between 1991 & 2003.

the soldier knows that the american embassy in Iraq
will NEVER EVER be gone &
that it is the largest in the world---
the soldier knows that the oil companies have been
feeding on the land since the first green light
like vultures tearing apart a carcass---
the soldier also knows that the contractors
who have been getting paid more than him/her
since the get-go
are flooding into Iraq
like it was going out of style
as s/he goes home for a short time
before they are called up again
to go to Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran or
even Australia
to bash bash bash the world into a bloody pulp
even further.

and over the “holidays”
the same soldier can discuss with their veteran relatives
from the Vietnam police action
just how great the empire is that they live in,
knowing first hand
better than anyone
just how far its greedy bloody talons can stretch---
then in tandem
they can all shove their fingers down their throats
to vomit up all that disgust again
because it never goes away.