In Baghdad, after bullets fired,
after fighters tired
and heads were at rest
off shoulders, off chests
the night there sounds the same
as it did in the Midwest
And I, I wondered what it would feel like
to walk through crowded streets
looking down at my dirty feet,
my unpolished leather boots
...A civilian again.
A man among men.
9 years ago last month
I marched myself down
and I signed up
I unplugged my playstation games
Learned weapons by their real names
Cut my hair off and gave myself up
and I thought I was doing the right thing.
I took orders, I marched in packs
I learned to give men heart attacks
with a rat-ta-tat-tat of automatic fire
and the plink of pin pulled from an m67
I watched men pray to a god not much different than mine
that they'd make it to their heaven,
while their own sons carried around guns
that our fathers had manufactured.
And it fractured my heart in many places.
And I wrote letters home to friends that had changed
Got letters back from a woman who had taken my name
Saying things like the weather is beautiful
wish you were here
and I wished I was there.
Letters saying algebra is hard
Letters saying got a speeding ticket, life sucks
Letters saying, graduated college, my life is over
And I tried not to write back
Oh man, how awful, quadratic equations,
Yesterday my buddy met the fella responsible for his creation
And the day before that Jerry was speeding down the interstate
hit a blast in the road and now he's missing his legs
And man, I wish I was there,
And man, I hope I get out
I hope I get out before
before my life is over
Three years ago last month
I came home to those friends that had changed
I came home to that woman who wanted to give me back my last name
and I stayed in bed for seven months,
I hung my head in shame
because I thought I had done the right thing.
And Jerry is a regular old Lieutenant Dan
wheeling himself around and living out of a van
And I speak to him every time he gives me the call
of Matthews, and Smith, and Barber- who never made it home at all.
Or of Adams who came home and hung himself in his parents basement
Adams, who, when he took that test for army placement
proved to be the smartest damn man to ever jump out of planes
And now all that is left is a piece of stone with his name
It is hard to not want to place the blame
When we thought we were doing the right thing.
In a hospital room, after fighting the war, after the war
my father laid in bed and told me he was planning a career suicide,
three days before he died
A military statistic,
blink and you'll miss it
on the evening news.
But hey, I hear our president
isn't planning on sending any new residents over there.
Maybe someday, someone is going to figure out
just what it means to do the right thing.