Nineteen Seventy's Spring

Spring came in a harsh fright this year.
Flushed up out of lush Cambodian jungles
By bewildered GI's, it set about opening
Cherry blossoms as though it had learned
Opening from soldiers' opening the doors of
Thatched huts or breaches of artillery pieces.

Scant shadows played through the chlorophyll feeling;
The wind was fractured with the crackle of death and
The stench of gunpowder fouled the breath of flowers.
Out of the unclenching cherry blooms students tumbled
Over the quadrangle's green and impotent fixed bayonets:
Disranked, unfiled, united by a hope to wake up silence.

Our armbands kept a constant pressure check against
The screams of life within us. We huddled our emotions
Together into blue-brown bundles by loud speakers
That amplified what armbands checked, informing
Ourselves of each other. We hoped to wake up silence
In protest against polluting spring with war.