The Babaji Wheelbarrow

by James Clark

It was a dry, dusty day when I saw the wheelbarrow, with long handles made of dark wood.

The wheel is struggling as it carries its burden, but it manages the job that it should. The man pushing appears to be crying, his eyes all puffy and red. It’s time to move on, but I wait, I wait for him to reach me instead. The wheelbarrow has a dark green cover, such a sickly, metallic sweet smell underneath, such a heavy lump in my throat, “don’t lift the cover!” but regardless, I pull it back to see.

The first thing to strike me, such a tiny hand, tiny fingers all bent into a fist, and an inch below there in my big gloved palm, the smallest most delicate wrist. Her face is held together by bright orange thread, her eyes are searching the stars. Her crown should still be there, on that beautiful head, where she lays crumpled up inside this fine cart. I put back the cover, swallow hard and just stand there, my head, Jesus Christ I can’t think, my pounding heart tearing itself apart inside my trained body, at this beautiful little angel in pink.

Her father, his eyes screaming toward me sobs gently, silent rage and yet deafening shock. Why can’t I bring myself to look into this man’s eyes, oh Lord, grant me some breath that I may talk. To say sorry, to ask why, to just speak in his tongue, to show him that I really care. I realise that I could never find words, I’ve no such tragedy to compare.

I walked away from the blue wheelbarrow, thinking that I could leave it behind. But every night as my daughter hugged me, that wheelbarrow crashed into my mind. Whenever she cried my stomach went tight, when she laughed those dark clouds disappeared, whenever she told me she loved me, I knew that I had nothing to fear, but yet so much. The wheelbarrow changed me forever, drank me to illness, and brought my whole life to the edge. I couldn’t switch off from that sweet smell, and I couldn’t explain that to friends.

I will never forget, such a small wrist in my hand, such beautiful soft lips kissing the sky. Such a pretty pink little dress, though stained red with blood, those clear and lifeless brown eyes. I wish that I had asked for her name, what to call that three year old victim of war, so small and so beautiful with those innocent eyes, my body aches that I can’t wish so any more.

If I could explain to people my demons, in one clear moment to make them understand. I’d draw that old wheelbarrow with the green cover, and that sweet delicate wrist in my hand. Two days after the wheelbarrow, I became a Father to my comfort for the rest of my life I will know. No matter how often the wheelbarrow returns, I have my daughter, here for me to hold.

It was a dry, dusty day when I saw the wheelbarrow.

James Clark is a Scottish Veteran of Afghanistan who served there in both 2009 and 2011 as a Reconnaissance operator and heavy weapons specialist. He was medically discharged with PTSD in 2013 and now volunteers as a Youth Mentor in Glasgow alongside his work as an Apprentice Gas Technician. His poetry is written as a way to communicate his experiences and to raise the awareness of conflict and its effect on soldiers.

welcome to the grenade range

by Anna Weaver

You are about to be handed a dangerous explosive.
You will follow all my commands.
(instruction given by range cadre upon issuing live grenades
to U.S. Army basic trainees)

I can’t tell you what it looks like
because they don’t let you watch
lookers get pushed down for their own good
but you want to feel it so think of thunder
think earthquake
think a live volcano in your hand
of course you’re nervous
it’s one shot one kill
what kind of grip do you have, private?
a death grip, sergeant, a death grip
change your grip and you’re a cooker
the grenade is cooking
counting down
seconds are passing
maybe your last
prepare to throw
throw
to Beruit and Bosnia
where the eyes of babushkas
watch from the pockmarked concrete
of the bunker you’re crouching in
blown to gaping
blown to numb
numb like shock
numb like a rock to your skull
now you’re crying like
a baby wakened by thunder
and you don’t know why
but it’s somewhere in Beruit
because of Beruit
because a crevice in your earthworks
rumbled open after the shockwave
moved through your bones
and now you are the bunker
huddled under a sulfur cloud and sinking
into the dirt
against the wall
hoping the wall will hold

Raised in Oklahoma, Anna Weaver served eight years as a parachute rigger in the U.S. Army Reserve. She writes about big sky, old boyfriends, and occasionally her time in service, which fell between Gulf Wars. Currently living in North Carolina with her two daughters, she has performed at open mic nights in Raleigh, Winston-Salem, Chicago, Atlanta, Nashville, and Savannah.

PTSD

by Charles F. Thielman

blue palms beating on the skins of city hives.
He twitches inside a firefight broadcast live

from the rainforests of his subconscious,
barking orders in his sleep. Snipered awake,
he crouches in double shadow between bed and wall.

He breathes deeply in, then out, slow, steady.
Fingering his imagination’s trigger, he dissolves
night-clad demons, then visualizes

a sun-warmed hamlet, teenagers flirting
and day-dreaming, three clean white blouses
drying in a light-filled breeze.

Preparing for a Friday at work,
he stretches six foot of solo in a doorway,
then readies himself in a mirror.

His true eyes opening without faith
in the ruins, apartment air striated
by the echoes of a lover’s last words,

needs clawing out of the grave
of one dream. Guttered candle
in a can at the curb.

Born and raised in Charleston, S.C., Charles Thielman moved to Chicago, was educated at red-bricked universities and on city streets. He worked at a Tripler Medical Center outpatient clinic helping wounded veterans. He is good friends with 2 Vietnam veterans, and his father spoke closely of leading the first Army Corps of Engineers company into Nagasaki after Japan’s surrender. Thielman is a loving grandfather for five free spirits!

PTSD

by Jon Turner

the fibers torn
are memories of gun battle
where bullets scream Allah
and the deafening song of explosions
dance where human flesh
once stood
There have been nightmares
that had made more sense, but
when dreams are reality
and clarity is non-apparent,
the gunpowder
sacred to our veins
is by all means the means of expression
when true meaning is burnt crisp, and
the screams fending for themselves
are still alone
in the desert

Jon Turner has used poetry and other forms of creative expression to understand his wartime experience in Iraq. He served two tours of duty in Iraq as an infantryman with the marines, as well as a humanitarian mission in Haiti in 2004. Currently Jon lives in Vermont with his family, working to build sustainable food operations with local farmers while further transcribing his memories with veterans.

Eternity

by Tessa Poppe

wrestle me upward
steal my dreams,
carry me into the vast,
Eternity.

bear my naked soul, and
sing me the gentler words
so I may forget my

Flesh,

vomit the linked chains,
restricting all,
The Everything.

effortless work, to die
to leave behind.
in yesterday lies
everything, untouched
undone, un.

never to see your face,
child, creation of my soul,
to be.
regretting, I buried you
in Selflessness and Ambition.

so I die with a crevice
in me,
and clear vision of that
rip in the sky.

all my worlds together,
loveless all the same,
barely a whisper now
the drowning
beat of the Drum

and slowly,
I see it,

Beautiful,

​​​End.

Tessa Poppe served in Iraq and Afghanistan as an MP with the Iowa National Guard. She is a native of the Midwest and a graduate of the University of Iowa, but currently lives in Virginia where she is attending graduate school. Tessa mainly writes short stories, flash fiction, and poetry.