--I’LL GO WITH YOU                                                               

Veteran

His brother took him to a pool hall,

bought him tequila and beer chasers,

farted out loud and

commented over the texture and vibrato of each. 

His brother laughed at anything—

 his own jokes,

the old geezer with a chin stuck inside his mug,

the skipping juke box saying, “You give love a bad naye-naye-naye-naye.”

This place had the classic arcade games—Pac Man and Space Invaders.  

Around 2:00 am

Stucky threw them the keys and said to close up,

 as if it was something he’d done a lot of times before.

He studied the homemade tattoos on his brother’s forearms. 

Everything was short, choppy and to the point,

 no word or ink mark wasting time on being clever: 

Nam

R.I.P.

JayDed

Old Glory Hole

The little gray bug men

marched across the screen in neat rows.

His brother shot them down with his finger beating the sweaty red button. 

He killed as many as he could. 

He seemed happy.