Over Tigris, in the Night. A (Rough) First Draft

October 9, 2008:

In a quiet waiting line
of Soldiers at the twilight.
Stirring when we hear
the rotor whine of
blades come near.

The crew chief waves us o’er
to his waiting craft.
Armored, belted, locked we sit
near each open door
on the frame – we lift!

Over groves of date palm
and scattered farms we streak.
Turning to follow Tigris’ path along,
our rotors sound an airborne Psalm.
A turbine-soul, given song.

Baghdad’s lights catch me
with a dazzling flash.
So low flew our mission
o’er Tigris’ flow, it seemed we
slipped into a dream-like vision

A flare a-lights, joins our Iraqi night,
but soon melts into the City colors.
The door gunners keep watch upon
the River banks as our flight
soars over bridges there - then gone.

We turn by the heart of Baghdad,
and the crew scans the night
one last time. Soon we dropped
to the silent concrete pad,
the rotor hum then abated.

Though my day was passing long,
the night had shown me wonders
and I was loathe to let them go.
Reverie takes the place of engine-song
The others silent, perhaps thinking so.

In Xanadu, er...Baghdad

did Kublai Khan... um, Saddam decree a...uh, mediocre pleasure dome decree:

Where Tigris the, waste filled river, ran

through qanats dug by man

Down to a sun baked sea.

So twice five meters of trash strewn ground

With T-walls and checkpoints were girdled round:

And there were a couple trees, right with post-no-bills,

Where blossomed not many a pigeon-bearing tree;

And here were parking lots less ancient than the hills,

Enfolding overly sunny spots of mundanity.

But oh ! that shallow sluggish chasm which slanted

Down the green non-hill athwart an urban cover !

A savage place ! as holed and disenchanted

As e'er beneath a waning moon was haunted

By woman wailing in fear of her Uday-lover !

And from this qanat, with ceaseless turmoil not seething,

As if this earth in dust filled pants were breathing,

A broken sewer pipe momently was forced :

Amid whose fetid half-intermitted burst

Huge fragments vaulted like horrid hail,

Or plastic bags as the trash collectors fail:

And 'mid these crumbling blocks at once and ever

It flung up momently the Tigris River.

Five kilometers meandering with a sluggish motion

Through palm grove and city front the polluted river ran,

Then reached the qanats dug by man,

And sank in oil slicks to a lifeless ocean :

And 'mid this tumult the now dead Saddam heard from far

Jaish al-Mahdi voices prophesying war !

The shadow of the cement dome of semi-pleasure

Floated midway on the waves ;

Where was heard the honking measure

From the traffic and the drivers' raves.
It was a miracle of traffic device,

A traffic circle blocked by a truck of ice!

A burkha with a dulcimer

In a bazaar once I saw :

It was an Assyrian crone (old),

And her dulcimer for food she sold,

Singing of Chemical Ali.

Could I revive within me

Her cackling and song,

To such a bet 'twould win me,
That with dollars and dinar long,

I would not build that crappy dome in air,

That shabby dome ! those bags of ice !

And all who heard should see them there,

And all should cry, Look There ! Look There !

His baggy eyes, his messy hair !

Weave a noose round him thrice,

And close your eyes with R Rated dread,

For he on Iraqi oil profits hath fed,

And spoilt the milk of Paradise.

My apologizes to Samuel Coleridge.

A Thought for the Earlier Occupant

Just a thought I might offer,
to you that used this port-o-let earlier.
Did you need finish that cigarette in here?
As if an outhouse in Iraq
did not already smell bad enough.