Memorial Day Parade

At times echo pebbles of machine guns
Scattered out of the snare drums.
Pseudo-poppies in the crowds flakked
The eye like pseudo-bloodstains.

But we were scrubbed to the grain,
Our scratches neatly tucked away under
Band-aids. The thrashing cadences of
Marching bands had overruled our pulses.

Firmly bayonetted in the VFW's navels, our
Flags groped hysterically toward where we
Came from—or, maybe, for the Brownies, who
Harbored giggles in circuses of flowers.

We rattled our patriotics through rust-free
Aluminum memories inside heads so healthy
As to be offended by the doctor's bills.
The monuments of our wars are all outside.

No blurting guns, no bombs disturb
The boredom in which we have begun to
Shoot ourselves and come to kill more
Easily for principles worth dying for.