Mail Call

On a lonely hill

Above an emerald green valley

Indian Country

Scan the sky

Two Skyhawks roar in low

Whistling death

Napalm

Screams

Choppa Choppa Choppa

The supply bird

Pregnant Guppy

Skyhawks, Rockets this time

Keeps them hunkered down

We rush to the LZ

Chopper lands,

Dust stings our faces

A PFC steps out

Starched utilities

A.J. squared away

He’ll learn

Maybe

We rush to unload

Four Deuce rounds

Plasma, more plasma

C-Rations. Don’t eat the cheese!

Give it to the Vietnamese

Lucky Strikes, ordinance green cans

Mail! From the World! Playboys!

Four Marines load Murphy

Lance Corporal, USMC

Seven digits

Serial Number

Catholic

Bagged and tagged

Corpsman loads a limping Corporal Kempton

Flesh wound

He’ll be back

A round kicks up dust

Near-sighted Nhat

He’s out of his hole

An M-60 answers

Short bursts

We work faster

The chopper roars off

The A-4s make a strafing pass

Quiet

Store the ammo

Head for the hooch

An hour later Sergeant Tocki enters

With the mail and the Word

He’s gruff

No letter for him, the Word is not good

Mail Call!

We gather round

Gomez!

The local paper

Homecoming Queen

Normal

Black!

Corporal Black is White,

PFC White is Black

All Marines are green, and grungy

Perfumed letter, X’s and O’s

Ooo La La!

Smith!

Box of cookies

Crumbled and old

It’s the thought

Murph….

Tocki chokes, his face blanches

He puts the letter aside

Wilson!

Wilson rushes to grab it

A letter from Jen

It’s typed

Shaky hands tear it open

It begins

Dear John….

LDT June 10, ‘23

          As I wrote this I remembered going through my Mother’s things after she died in 1988. She had saved my letters from Vietnam. I grabbed them. They were part of my history, but best kept in a box. Then I wondered why she had kept these letters and no others. Today it hit me. She never knew which one would be the last.

Semper Fi!

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