A True War Story
My firend's uncle
was a Marine in Korea.
His squad comes to a cluster of huts
smoke drifting up from one.
The sergeant orders him
to go into that hut,
to kill everyone inside.
He steps cautiously through the door
and waits for his eyes to adjust.
In the dim light he sees a Korean grandmother,
terrified children huddled up against her.
He squeezes the trigger on his M1,
empties it into the thatched roof,
and steps back out
through that doorway.
No one speaks.
Back home,
when he tells the old people
what he has done,
they give him a new name:
He-Who-Takes-Pity-On-His-Enemy,
and make him
the Giver-of-Names
for new-born children.
from On the Chinese Wall - New & Selected Poems 1966 — 2018
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