War Poet.ca - A CFAP Project by Suzanne Steele

sniper lesson (4)

Aug 31, 2010  ·  No comments

draw the enemy
draw the enemy out.

who said any of this
would be easy?

no muscle flinch,
word. silence.

still. still.
still. the adder within.

but listen to hiss.
the coolness of his skin.

do not feed
never feed him

strike. feel
nothing

only the satisfaction
of remorselessness.

— smsteele

---

wadi (5)

Aug 29, 2010  ·  No comments

you signed on for every patrol you could.
your death wish. that you’d step. on metal/plate/wires.
sierra echo out. done. finished. black. gone.
me to you on Sat. phones, “smarten up. smarten up.
stop that crazy talk. there are good years. still to come.
the baby waiting to be born” but you couldn’t hear.
your heart. brain-dead. too many years of sleep dep.
dread. your ears so filled with far too much.
you couldn’t hear “I love you” sanded soft
between our words. words planed. words turned.

then today I understood. rode my bike hard
into the season. turning leaves like salt. in the forest.
on the gravel. path. without you I didn’t care
to stop. wished cars would T-bone my heart.
over-filled. the heavy rains. a wadi green. unstill.

— smsteele

---

Suffield tree

Aug 27, 2010  ·  No comments

they say l sing the dead
my worthless words so damned
needy; my fingers grasp, tap
a lidded laptop
like roots into hard, dust-bowl soil;
I am alone, I am scorched,
like the roots of that tree
razor-wired, I am shadeless,
like that tree
in the desert of Suffield,
down the long gravel
road, into the valley,
the valley that casts
no shadow, that valley
where boys I once knew
laughed. boys that are gone,
cannot return. boys I saw last
a maple leaf cinched and strapped
their country’s embrace, their mother’s
embrace, the kiss, last kiss
on their grave. that kiss so warm
so cold. they say I sing the dead
but I am so damned alone,
like that tree at Suffield.
razor-wired. rootless.
cannot sing.

— smsteele

---

what I did not expect

Aug 26, 2010  ·  No comments

today, Suffield. the field. the rolling, beginning of the Cyprus hills. the pronghorns I saw first in spring 2009. before everything changed. gone. my old life. comfort.

I wore a shalwaar kameez, a veil. comforting. the gauzy cloth keeping the dirt, the gaze of others from my face. and cool in today’s 40 C heat. desert clothes are perfect for dry, hot prairie in August.

I saw a different army in play. different camo, different guns, but also the same. all soldiers are soldiers.

and these, young. so young. fresh out of battle school. their faces, soft under all that dirt, scissored my day.

because I saw him. one of the young ones I knew back in ’09. his face soft under all that dirt. alive. I saw him in all of their faces. the one I witnessed brought home. the piper piping Flowers of the Field. his mother. his father. his brother. we all brought him home.

then weariness settled like Suffield’s weird green dust. on me. and no amount of tears seem to be able to wipe it off.

— smsteele

---

suffield redux

Aug 26, 2010  ·  No comments

heading into the box. one of the most loathed. the green dust. the inevitable sickness. (if you don’t get sick on an Ex. at Suffield you haven’t really been to Suffield it seems).
should be interesting to see another side. of this war. this time, British.

— smsteele

---

before the storm (wadi 3)

Aug 22, 2010  ·  No comments

my truck over the Texas cattlegate. ta da ta da da
through the grasslands before storm, the air warm

gooey grey, the peregrines grounded, the golden eagle,
grounded,the ferruginous hawk, grounded. all grounded

like Apaches, Chinooks, Hercs, the BF Russian
transports grounded. before a metal storm.

ennui sets in. all is heavy. before prairie
lightening. an impatience. lourd. this is waiting.

waiting. for the wadi to fill. it is still and green.
slimy. her shadow is an oily shadow. cut from algae.

face down she lay.
and I was once that girl.

floating. my black hair a grassy halo.
face down. my father found me before.

it was too late. ran. for me. shouted. for me.
I should have drowned. as our three have been drowned.

Edwin,
Courtenay,
Chris.

the soldiers ran. dropped weapons. handed.
help. were helpless to save.

this baby girl. her Kuchi dress
ballooning. stagnant water.

was hand
sewn.

— smsteele

---

wadi (2)

Aug 21, 2010  ·  1 comment

late August. I ride my bike through the village. the little French village on the edge of the heart. the heart of this generous continent.

the smoke, BC’s forest fires, exhalation, the choked lungs of too much summer heat, lightening storm, the lit grass, the forest crackle. burn burn. the smoke screen. like a thousand thousand smoke grenades. is gone. now only that blue. no, not only. only will not do. it is the prairie

sky. blue as beloveds’ eyes.

how lovely. the hot wind. how lovely my bones, my body warmed young. on a bicycle. through the white grasses. the still green hills soft as breasts. the wide prairie, the belly. the river valley that place of beginning.

when I die, could it be sweetly in this valley, just to begin again. here?

the black horse has moved on. the irrigation ditch has drained into puddle. gone the bright green water my child and I dangled our July feet into. the flood gates are open.

the black horse has moved on. unlike its brother at the Arghandab. tethered forever in soldiers’ memories. the wadis slimed green. the child floating floating. facedown. some horrible dream soldier will carry to his grave.

her tiny dress waving waving. embroidered. mirrored. little celebration.

gone.

— smsteele

---

Sniper Lesson 3 (Audio)

Aug 20, 2010  ·  No comments

The latest installment of the WarPoet podcast featuring poems read by the author, Suzanne Steele.
Sniper Lesson

— smsteele