Exiles: 1962 Poem by Percy Dovetonsils

Transferred to Missouri
on orders from the Pentagon
that were my father’s, not mine
(I was drafted, he volunteered)
I already knew the drill
“Don’t look back! ”
and ruthlessly dropped everything:
the brief life I’d built in Pennsylvania,
the A’s, the American Legion Award, the friends,
like pick up sticks
for whatever the future of warfare held.
At least Pop had his career on file somewhere.
I had nothing but myself
that first day
at the new school-
an improvement, at least,
on the other newly transferred family,
killed, every one, at dead man’s corner,
driving to the base.
This was NORAD, the fighters roaring off
or crashing,
black mushrooms rising from the runway
signaling another daddy dead.
Air Force brats, each one sired
and ruled over by a lifer,
made their brief liaisons but had no illusions
in the war of all against all:
Spikes in the face during football
readied us for our lot:
the Cuban Missile Crisis
Viet Nam, Desert Storm, Iraq
- a war without end
(not everyone bore its weight equally)
ranging from cold to hot.