There was so much to remember, so much to recall. So much to see and know and feel, so many dead to hold on to. So many dead. Even one life was too full. Even one life was so long and bloody, he could hardly bear it.
But that’s what the poem was for. It was all there, his first love and his last, his long-dead father and long-lost sons, the fall of Baghdad and the coup d’état, the many revolutions. He remembered Mohammed al-Sadr’s Independence Guard and the revolt against the British, the bright hope—he was what, fourteen? The shining dream of nation… He remembered fighting the Kurds, his years in the army, his wife, young, the late twenties, the days of hope as the people grew slowly to become Iraq—then Independence: 1932. There were celebrations.
We might as well have been mourning, he thought, for all the good it did us.
In the Assyrian revolt, he killed Assyrians. In the Shi’a revolt, he killed Shi’a. He helped protect the Turkish Petroleum Company, then the Iraqi Petroleum Company, as they pumped out the people’s wealth and the people’s oil. A coup, an assassination, another coup, the British returned and occupied Basra, Umm Qasr… The collapse, the Farhud, Iraqi Jews blamed and murdered, banished. And then, in 1948, the Catastrophe, the diabolical birth of the Zionist state and the war in Palestine. He led his men through the Jezreel Valley and up the Tell el-Mutesellim, which the Jews call Har Megiddo, fighting the Zionists, and many good men died. All for nothing.
It was all written down, and all for nothing. And many years later, when he dared speak his mind, when he dared utter the truth, was he not punished? Saddam had struck him down—but had not killed him, and that was his mistake. For do I not yet write? Do I not mark the truth in my book? Do I not chronicle my poem for the ages, to be sung by my children’s children’s children? They would blind me, but I see the truth. I see the truth and I write the truth, and our truth shall outlive theirs.
He jabbed the stub of his tongue against his teeth and pressed his pen to the blackened page. Another sura remained to be written.
Qasim gathered his strength. He was better now, though his hand was still weak. He’d decided: staying in Baghdad was cowardice. He went to Mohammed and asked to use the Toyota to go home to his wife in Baqubah.
Mohammed was proud but worried. There would be many dangers, not just the Americans. There were looters, Fedayeen—who knew? And where would you get benzine if you needed it? And what would you do if something happened? Qasim agreed that it might be difficult but argued that he should go sooner rather than later. No one knew when, or if, things would settle down. There might never be a better time than now. “I understand,” Mohammed said, “but you’re still healing. Stay a few more days.”
“I’m strong now, Uncle. I’ve waited too long already.”
“Qasim, you’re still weak. You’re not well enough yet. I can’t let you go alone. It’s too dangerous.”
“Uncle, please,” Qasim said, going to one knee before Mohammed at the kitchen table. “I have to go.”
“No. You have to wait. I can’t spare myself or Ratib to take you, and we need the Toyota here. This is more of your foolishness. Wait until things calm down, and we’ll figure something out.”
Othman watched the discussion from the other end of the kitchen, fiddling with his lighter. Then he tapped it loudly on the table. “I’ll go,” he said.
Mohammed waved the idea away. “Don’t be an idiot.”
“I’ll go with him. I can shoot, I can drive. I know the roads. We both know some English.”
“A fool and a cripple. What a team.”
“Mohammed, my friend, it’s only seventy-five kilometers. I’ll go visit your sister-in-law, drop off Qasim, and I can be back the next day or the day after. I have an old friend in Baqubah I’d like to check up on. Consider it a favor—to me. I want to see your nephew do the right thing. Let me help him.”
Mohammed frowned, remembering the day he’d picked Othman up from al-Amn al-Amm, the Directorate of General Security: his face bruised, teeth missing, wincing as he got in the car, but smiling and joking as if nothing had happened. They said goodbye soon after, Othman going into exile in Lebanon, Mohammed not knowing if he’d ever see his friend again. He remembered Othman reciting from the Qu’ran the day he left: “Does there not pass over man a space of time when his life is a blank?” This time felt different, but how could you know? And what could he do? A man must follow the recitation of his soul. Mohammed shook his head in resignation. “Fine,” he said. “Fine.”
Qasim thanked Othman and Mohammed, then ran upstairs to pack. The two older men said nothing for a long time, smoking in silence until Mohammed stubbed out his cigarette and stood up. “Bring the car back safe,” he said, “or Thurayya will kill both of us.”
The poet’s eyes gleamed. “Insha’Allah.”
babylon
Nothing is over: This is the story of a long-haired half-crazed Vietnam vet, harassed by small-town lawmen, lost on his one-man mission of vengeance. Back in the war, he was part of a ragtag team of misfit soldiers, hand-picked for a suicide mission to kill Hitler. Good and evil. He’s a downed fighter pilot. He’s red and white and blue.
This is the story of the sword. Gun. Dawn
patrols blacktop sit guided in a bad hundred feet drowned
gulf
military units added to the
brass shell dogs devour battle
so they too were made of vanity and 72 hours not from the stories of previous wars. Violence inflicted on the largest burden themselves, some of which depicted pyramids and the rest shocked of no-man’s land. Lee Marvin leads a ragtag gang of misfits through the hell of war and loss of innocence as they fight for freedom and America from the deserts of North Africa to the forests of Germany. He’s an idealistic young officer leading his all-black regiment on a suicide attack on a coastal fortress. No-man. Through me tell the story of one man’s rage and the razing of an ancient city. He’s an idealistic young officer charged with cowardice for refusing to send his men to their death on a suicide attack
new reports
electricity
widening the circle of direct blame for shooting it up my ass. On first setting eyes, alas, my son, harassed by small town artillery emplacements, a bridge no more. Night and day did I glory in misfits hand-picked and leads a ragtag bunch of strength to all in Troy both men and hell. From the glory. A young man discovers commando war nothing, for no one pilot develops a tenuous ragtag bunch of All-American right hand like a lizard but that’s not hell, a bunch of ragtag boots lying like getting my machine impression of his wife the flow I mean when I voted for hell, horses in administrative succession, running the Achaeans divide the fate DETAINEE-07’s allegations
a tale of courage and honor, loyalty, grace under pressure and the will to win. He’s a young, dedicated soldier sent up the river to kill a rogue agent. He’s a drunk, grizzled vet sergeant fighting bureaucratic bullshit to transform a ragtag bunch of misfits into a steely band of killers, leading them to glory in the assault on Grenada. The allegations of
this man alone, unsupported, allegations of abuse, his statements available, Peleus, for he is mightier than you. Nevertheless, intel interests dogs and vultures, and a load of grief would be lifted from my damage Iraq’s eyewitness reports, life, both Iraqis cried: The British Academy has committed Muslims. Like people attacking a library. Ragtag. A young glory. An Army Special Forces operative goes up the river. A young man joins the Marines and becomes a photographer and is sent to Vietnam and learns that war is hell is hell. War story. A retired Special Forces operative returns to Vietnam to rescue his POW buddies. This is the story of the Center in Washington D.C. where he practiced for conventions of war or rules had no way to confirm they were the war near equipment in civilian areas, maintaining Abu Ghraib largely with Iraqis of “no intelligence” a lot firmer, particularly his own military; a final atrocity exploited for detainees were meant to be “exploited for” many shops know coalition forces prisoners scooped up in this way soon flooded the keepers taken all the campaign on the harsh terrain of disadvantages nighttime sweeps gave Saddam 48 hours on the harsh terrain of detainees at Abu Ghraib whomsoever Allah overcrowding difficulties