O-Dark-Thirty

Apr 26

The Spider

by Jim Barrett

I had an opportunity today. I sat in my chair—trying to work out a plot problem when I pushed away from my howling computer (yeah—it howls, even snarls, when I can’t figure shit out) and leaned back in my chair. I looked skyward, really, ceilingward (if that’s a word) at the light above my head. It was then that I noticed a life and death struggle. There was a spider caught in the bowl of the light. I saw it clearly—a black eight-legged outline against the forty watt bulb that illuminated it. I was transfixed.

Apr 23

The Letters

by Alicia DeFonzo

“You know, your grandmother only wrote me once during the war?” he says, sipping his scotch, staring out at the Chesapeake Bay which he can no longer see. I look at him with her eyes. It was the first I heard of it. He wouldn’t lie to me, but I wonder how this could be true.

Apr 22

Know Thy Enemy

by Jonathan Tennis

Throughout the ages,

We have labeled them

Enemy

To make us feel they are different

To make us feel they are not the same

To make us feel nothing about them

To make us feel nothing about their cause

But they are the same

They are mothers and fathers

Brothers and sisters

Sons and daughters

Wives and husbands

We are the same

But they have to die

Because we labeled them enemy.

Sun Tzu said

Know thy enemy

Know thyself.

I don’t know how to tell the difference.

Jonathan Tennis served an enlistment in the United States Army, with a deployment to Iraq in support of OIF. He is a graduate of Eckerd College (BA) and Norwich University (MSIA), resides in Tampa, Florida where he enjoys writing, reading, year-round sunshine, traveling, and biking.

Apr 21

Cycle of Violence

by Seabass

June 2004

Husaybah, al-Anbar Province, Iraq

Four of my Marine Force Recon teammates lay spread-eagle in deep sleep on the dusty concrete floor beside me. As they recovered from physical and emotional exhaustion, Brian and I stood watch, scanning the city from the blasted-out windows of the building’s top floor. Before dawn, our team had clandestinely occupied the abandoned Saddam-era Iraqi government office, known to us as the “Crack House.” Miraculously, we had remained unseen from the vigilant civilians and combatants by low-crawling in through a weed- and shit-filled ditch which ran next to our new hide site. Like hunters eager to kill a trophy buck, we searched the alleyways below with high-powered optics, hoping to catch our prey off-guard as the sun rose.

Apr 16

Trash Bag Conversion

by Chad Pettit

On a Sunday afternoon drive with my family
I stop the car in the middle of the road.
My wife panics, asks what’s the matter?
On the side of the road sits a trash bag.
It’s just plastic, but I can smell smoke
and hear the squelch of a radio.

“Report.”

The other drivers pass me, heads shaking.
I sit paralyzed, white-knuckling the steering wheel,
foot trembling on the brake pedal.
My wife tells me to breathe, but I’m
hypnotized by a wire that isn’t there.
My boots heel-to-toe step on mortar-shelled roads.

The radio on my shoulder demands a report.

Do I hear the choppers hovering? Hovering overhead? No.
No support this mission.
I spot mud huts and trash pile homes on the road
to the landfill city as I
figure-eight–scan freshly paved
American roads.

“Sitrep, over.”

My wife says it’s a trash bag, tells me to drive.
My heart beats to the rhythm of incoming,
and the boom of outgoing
steals my breath.
I see starving men with zip-tie bound wrists,
and sandbags covering their heads on highways of rubble.

“All clear, nothing to report, over.”

I look for the rifle they took away,
replaced with a gear shift.
I push my sunglasses up my sweating face,
take my wife’s hand, waiting in my lap
and drive past the trash bag slowly
without blinking.

Chad Pettit served in the Army Infantry for ten years, including two combat tours to Iraq. He teaches high school English and has a B.A. in English from Texas A&M University-Central Texas. He lives with his wife and four children in Copperas Cove, TX. His poems have appeared in The Lookout and The Anuran.

Mar 8

Nowhereville

by J. Scott Price

There’s this valley someplace
that looked like
all the rest
though none of us knew
it contained our death.

A simple shithole of a spot
with no name on a map–no
grand historical battle space.
Just
a trap.

So there’ll be no consolation,
no transferred dignity
for our beloveds
when reverent whispers ask,

Where did they serve, how did they die?

Thankfully, though, no unmarked graves for us.
Our buddies brought our bodies back.

But I’ve met others
since that day I named the Paradox of Pain
without that seemingly simple,
reassuring
luxury.

Their remains
remain where they fell
and turned to dust
in some other Nowhereville.

J. Scott Price served as an infantryman in the Virginia Army National Guard from 1986 until 2011, and deployed for both OIF and OEF. This poem gestated from events in Afghanistan and emerged seven years after his return.

Jan 7

Acting at War

by Travis Klempan

Red Merrill chewed the gum not on account of its breath-freshening capabilities, nor because he had food stuck in his teeth. (Protein shakes left behind a filmy grit but he washed this away with overchlorinated Iraqi water.) He chewed with no intention of blowing bubbles—it weren’t that kind of gum either—but just because it gave him something to do, and he’d grown sick of dipping tobacco.

Jan 6

The New Ship

by Garland Davis

He could see the cruiser in the mists at the end of the pier as he walked toward it, his seabag rocking lightly on his shoulder. Funny he always thought it was heavier than this. Although the pier was in golden sunlight, the ship was blurred, the gray almost silvery in the cloudy mist.

Jan 4

Twenty-two a Day

by Kama O’Connor

1. He’s been lying on top of his cheap, cotton comforter, staring at the walls that still have nothing on them—what would he hang that won’t remind him of the life he’d given up?—for three hours now. The clock reads 12:01 a.m. He had to stay late at the office to make up for the mistake he’d made on the quarterlies. What a joke, he thinks. None of this matters—the reports that told companies where their fractions of a cent were going, and when those fractions were dropped because of a loss in an arbitrary market half a world away. His fucking twenty-two year-old supervisor, just out of college, who kept coming by his small-assed cubicle, whining about shit he’d messed up…. Sometimes three times a day he had to listen to this desk jockey spout off about the importance of these reports and not shove his fist down the kid’s throat and tell him what really mattered in this world. It wasn’t a fucking report, that was for goddamn sure. So he gets up, walks to his closet, takes down the box he doesn’t let himself open often. His old life, the life he was proud of. Would always be proud of. He brushes the dust off the box with the heel of his palm, unlocks it, opens the lid, and stares. Each piece pokes at the pale, soft man he’s become since he took this job a year ago. His retirement certificate. Twenty years of drills and deployments and killing and not dying and broken relationships and training training training with only half a pension and a piece of paper to show for it. Still, he takes it out gingerly, places it beside him, and uncovers more relics. His service medals. A NAM with a combat “V.” A good cookie—ha! He should show this to his supervisor. Afghan service, Iraq service, OIF, OEF, Desert Storm. All conflicts, wars that showed him what the world really looked like. Ugly. Painful. Unfair. Underneath the medals is his grandfather’s old service revolver. He decides to play a game. Roulette, with only one player. The thrill it gives him sends shocks of an old—almost forgotten—feeling through his veins, charges him in a way he hasn’t felt in almost two years. He smiles, digs for the case of ammunition. Retrieves one bullet. A .22 caliber slug that he places in the chamber. Spins it, locks it in place. Holds the gun to his forehead and closes his eyes, excited that this is a game he can play and win, even if he loses. Because it reminds him what matters. This feeling. This. He starts the game.

Jan 4

Fer-de-Lance

by Elizabeth Hawes Unangst

“Forget it,” the big man said, chuckling. “Out of the question. Far too dangerous for my clumsy little wife. You’re not exactly athletically inclined, you know, babe.” He gestured beyond the villa’s veranda to the lush green terraces sweeping down to the ocean below. “Besides, silly girl, why would you want to leave this gorgeous view?” Without waiting for an answer, he laughed, kissed her on the nose, slapped her on the bottom, shouldered his clubs, and left, calling, “Wish me luck on the links, babe!” as he went.