Poetry – New Poems for a New War by Sam Patterson

I.

I’m afraid of every poem
I write; they all remember.
I know I cannot write
of the missing, rubble, flags,
hardhats, pieces of planes and
skyscrapers, without conjuring two seconds
of film- second plane hits
second tower. I want to
remember the dead, but I
pray to forget the news.

II.

But the news brings hopeful
signs of embellishment and emptiness.
The president says be brave
and spend spend spend it
on a flag to fade
on your dashboard. Newspaper flag
taped across half your rear
window, you’ve got a blind
spot for patriotism, and a
gas mask in your car.

III.

Everyday, all day the news
is endless drum rolls for
the coming war. The war
will be invisible; you see
already we cannot find the
casualties. We count posters instead.
The secret war will thwart
the evil doers, the victory
invisible, far away, silent,
unwitnessed, at the very end.