Empires Go To Hell: A Poem by Dennis Serdel

For Veterans Day, 2012

By Dennis Serdel, Vietnam 1967-68 (one tour) Light Infantry, Americal Div. 11th Brigade, purple heart, Veterans For Peace 50 Michigan, Vietnam Veterans Against The War, United Auto Workers GM Retiree, in Perry, Michigan

Empires Go To Hell

the heat seeps through the helmet
boils the sheet metal on all the desert
camouflaged trucks and vehicles
the oversized rucksack pulls
on the shoulders
grinds away on the gut
everybody is not fighting the war
only a few considering
all the Soldiers around the world
this long war is taking its toll
like sores eating the brain
the body is beginning to ache
the head the back the legs
grind on but the pain pills
only help but canʼt cure exhaustion
they canʼt give back
the days the months the years
who canʼt count all the steps
nobody can count the miles
and waiting feel the minutes
the hours the days then go on
wasting a life for this battlefield
that goes back to blood on the soil
to every invasion by all sorts
of empires in the past
where only cemeteries
and memorials remain
the world must get rid of empires
all they do is invade and rape
small countries for any type
of gold the little countries have
but the empires may be
brought down within
and work against the empires
of the world until there
are no empires anymore.