who likely were reluctant to be brave.
Sitting by a slow fire on a waste
of snow, I would last about an hour.
Better not euphemize the grave.

In this fashionable town, endearments are the mode
though generals are appraised — not praised —
and one is not forced to walk about
where a muddy slough serves as a road.

‘What are these shadows barely
visible, which radar fails to scan?’
ships ‘keeping distance on the gentle swell.’
And ‘what is a free world ready

to do, for what it values most?’
bestow little discs the bereaved may touch?
forget it even when dead —
that congressionally honored ghost

mourned by a friend whose shoulder sags —
weeping on the shoulder of another
for another; with another sitting near,
filling out casualty tags.

What of it? We call them the brave
perhaps? Yes; what if the time should come
when no one will fight for anything
and there’s nothing of worth to save.

Readings

We Call Them the Brave read by Elizabeth McGovern
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