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Thank You for Your Service

He declines

the beer but takes my hand

with a hand like cast-iron.

After the old men signed

treaties, we took

the people's kindness

like Coca-Cola syrup--

something to calm

the stomach after a long,

long bad night. I drank

until I forgot the vows

I'd made on those

now-free fields: to women,

to saints, to friends.

I was lucky. I made myself

careless.