GHOST SOLDIERS

                                                Ghosts noisily roam

                                                In my mental zone.

                                                Ghosts of those slayed

                                                For wrongs they played

                                                In a time long gone

                                                In a war long done

                                                Where soldiers cried

                                                As enemies and friends died

                                                Then survivors live life

                                                Memories slice like a knife

                                                Cutting through brains

                                                With barely concealed pains

                                                To kill or be killed

                                                With hearts so chilled.

                                                No thoughts were nice

                                                While hearts became ice

                                                And I walk past the dead

                                                Slaughtered with my lead.

                                                Lives taken; oaths crossed

                                                Emotions frigid as frost

                                                Then come home, yet be lost

                                                As a nation wonders at the cost.

                                                Never killed a baby,

                                                Though others might have, maybe.

                                                In an airport I sit

                                                Alert to avoid spit.

                                                My feral eyes staring bright

                                                At protestors in sight.

                                                Not a war, formal,

                                                The terrain not normal.

                                                Then back home with Purple Heart

                                                It feels like a poisoned dart.

                                                Be calm they say

                                                Yet feel terror each day.

                                                Then die during peace

                                                Because guilt will not cease.

                                                To constantly feel the chill,

                                                Of knowing it is easy to kill,

                                                Then hide all those tears

                                                Behind a façade of civilian years,

                                                Yet stay haunted in your mind

                                                By clamoring ghosts so unkind.