Zero Fighter Pilot Poem by Bernard Henrie

Hiroyoshi speaks quietly
of the girlfriend
he had four years ago;
she wore western clothes,
a dark velvet skirt
to the ankles suitable
for an orchestra and ballroom;
a severe jacket, an oversize brass
chrysanthemum at the lapel.

Hiroyoshi and I fly everyday,
my uniform hangs down like his
in the humid press of the jungle
surrounding our airfield.

Overhead, short-waisted bitterns
wheel and fall on the yellow
canebrakes. Any puff of wind
like steam off a kettle.

We see the growing number
of empty chairs, pilots missing
from our mess tent.

He writes to his sweetheart,
then sets the paper aside.
We will soon fly again.

We withdraw from the new men,
rarely learn their names,

Airborne,
he calls to alert me,

Sakai,

Sakai!

our two fighters surround
an Australian Kittyhawk in a ripe line of sky.

We fire until the plane disappears over
the soiled mass of Port Morseby.

In our tent, a sleepwalking Hiroyoshi
writes a poem:

High-up the seedless clouds are matted, ruffled white
as face powder. Sakai signals "go home."
A motor is hardly needed to pull my plane toward base.
I set the fuel lever to "Lean" and edge the cockpit screen open,
fresh air sweeps around me and I am a flight scarf free in wind,
my only friend goes ahead and I follow rising on the incense
of chrysanthemum ash.