The Sixties--1967 Poem by Sandy Fulton

1967
The Navy sent me to New York City
to prowl the colleges
and recruit young naval officers.

Long-haired beaded kids
picketed and threatened other recruiters
but sat at my table chatting amiably.
I never said I agreed with them,
but picked up their literature and listened.
That was all they wanted,
and it changed me.

What kind of monster was I
to send young vulnerable flesh
into a war I loathed?
Vietnam hung like an albatross
on America's shoulders,
sapping our strength, killing us by stages.

John would retire soon
and could march against the war
without fear of court-martial.

He came down on weekends,
once got off the train at 125th Street,
walked through Harlem at night,
conspicuous at six foot two in Navy uniform,
a freckled redhead with a Carolina drawl,
stopping occasionally, entering a bar,
saying howdy, never mocking,
listening with sympathy to anger and frustration
in accents very like his own.

But when he retired
he went back to his ex-wife
for the kids' sake.

That was the year the hippies celebrated Love Summer.
I did not.