Smelling Memories

Smelling Memories

He hears the ringing and screaming

And smells the iron in the burning blood-

Like melting pennies, never forgot.

He watches blurred figures staggering around

And as he stands, he becomes one.

His feet and hands are still intact,

Though, his thoughts are not.

Ignoring the cracks of the passing bullets, he

Becomes entranced at the destruction of hate.

A child’s shoe at his boots, still tied with a small foot inside

Like it’s ready to run.

A woman’s scalp, hair intact was next.

Long and matted from the now cake dried brown blood.

The face of the man he shook hands with

Blown off his body and

Like a mask, it could be worn.

It was as if a surgeon with a scalpel

Perfectly removed the skin.

Hollowed eyes

Halloween décor engulfed the street.

And the fucking melting pennies

Went straight to long term storage.

I remember lighting a cigarette as I watched him die.

There was nothing to be done.

At 18 years old, this was my first patrol.

The adrenaline after combat was something

Equivalent to the feeling of before, during, and after sex.

And just like sex, I flicked my cigarette and was

Ready to go again.

I had felt the power equivalent to God’s and I wanted more.

These people had been reduced to a lesser species to us

Even before we came here, our brains had been manipulated.

In basic training the drill sergeants would ask,

“What makes the green grass grow?”

“Blood, blood, blood makes the green grass grow”

We are generation kill.

Man, nature, love… We kill it all, and we do a damn good job at it.

Through a controlled breath and gentle trigger squeeze he let the bullet fly.

Traveling at 2,580 feet per second

His bullet hit you in less than 1.

Through a scope, he studied you for days.

He knew your every move.

But you never knew he was there.

Though, you might’ve felt something watching you.

He only moved in the cover of darkness.

He was the “ghost warrior.”

He watched your family and friends wail

Over your crying and gurgling body.

His favorite smell is the carbon from his fired weapon.

His favorite weapon was whatever could kill you.

He dreams of your face every night

He is able to sleep.

We never seemed to dwell on the deaths of one of ours.

We laughed and cussed and smoked after skirmishes.

We counted bullets shot and mortars launched.

Pilots would say over the radio how many pounds of

Bombs they dropped, sometimes on an innocent village.

“Collateral damage.” We would say and shrug.

Ignoring the scars our minds were scraping.

The local population was just so filthy and ungrateful

To us, they were rats.

We didn’t care for the mission.

We just wanted to fucking kill.

We even fought each other when we were bored.

I remember the first time I saw a dead American.

We were traveling down Route Tampa in Baqubah, Iraq.

Our enemy started lining IEDs with heavy amounts of copper,

Which would melt on explosion and form a huge projectile

Capable of punching through most armored vehicles.

I was standing in one of the hatches.

We were listening to Bob Marley’s “Don’t Worry Be Happy”

The vehicle in front of us hit the IED and immediately burst into flames.

4 of us ran to the vehicle and started pulling people out.

The driver couldn’t get out the back, so we ran to his front hatch.

A huge piece of armor had been blown off and landed directly on it,

Which hindered us from opening the hatch.

We burned our hands trying to lift the metal.

He cried for his mom.

I cried for mine.

Take a handful of pennies and smell it deeply.

That is exactly what burning death and blood smells like.

He once came across one of his dying targets.

Again, he sought comfort in a cigarette.

“Why did you kill me?”

“I had to…But don’t worry, I’ll die too,

A hero just like you.”