We Were Soldiers Once Poem by Iohannes Silvaticus

We were soldiers once,
With dynamite as teeth
And limbs.
The food pyramid was
A square biscuit shared
Between the two of us
And I could taste the gunpowder
Beneath your nails.
You cracked the cracker
(It almost resounded,
Reverberations of thunder.)

You rained inside
When I removed the pin
From the grenade.

Ponchos were pretty much useless
In such situations,
But you were always good at ducking bullets.

I sowed them for breakfast
And harvested no less for dinner.

We were soldiers once.
And then I thought
If freedom had a smell,
It would be like margarine.

You hated it more than napalm,
Margarine.

We use to rub it between our loins
To keep away abrasions
On long rides.

I loved how we slept back to back
To keep our heads out of the mud.

Life seems to have brought us
More surprises than war
Ever prepared us for.