Another Troubled Man Poem by Jack Worthington

He said he was from Colorado, then from Texas
I'm still uncertain from where but somewhere out there
Where the dust clowds blow in the summer air
Many small towns are out there, where America despairs.

Consuming his drink he called himself the son of wetbacks
No shame in that I said, were all wetbacks in a round about way
Buying another round we settled into the final hour of the day
Sitting there in noisy silence, he recalled the attack.

His company lurched forward, then stopped, then forward again
A loud bang, then nothing, then screaming, then pain
Nothing unusual about the story, such is war, which is wild
My mind kept repeating, only a few years ago this man was a child.

I suspected this child was cut loose far before his service
Tenderness at a tender age is a luxury, a purple heart a tradgedy
War should only be witnessed by the jaded, by the Sadducees
But the jaded do not fight, repercussions make them nervous.

He slipped down another pain killer with his beer
The pain he was feeling was in between his ears
With the first he complained about his back
But his mind still raw, was still in Iraq.

Closing time the bartender said, as the night faded into mourning
Our beers since finished, sat as fallen soldiers, a memory of time
The last witnesses to a battle in a troubled man's fallen mind
Parting ways, I could only feel sadness, and a sense of forlorning.