Nightmare Abroad

Three years have been a lifetime, In a place unfathomable- Met with a gun barrel to the scalp, Scars cover his back, tortured for freedom, Punished for a woman he loves who stands proud with her flame to the sky signaling opportunity… Starved with aching intestines, dreams of Mother’s cornbread, visions of his homeland. He awakens to skin crawling, feet burning, lesions- Forgotten? He dreams of her, with her pointy tiara, and her book of law, and justice. No justice here. Breaking back, cracked lips- Struggling alone, his language is unheard, laughable, PROPAGANDA. He is kicked, beaten, ....Cornbread fills his nostrils, he can smell the sweet butter.. He opens his eyes, through tears and blood. Blisters are open and burn his hands, calloused and course. His eyes grow cold, as his hair crawls down his shirt to his spoon, into his cabbage water. He cries inside, for his innocence lost, for who this will make him become….for what he cannot have. Inhumane, he is like cattle and he is branded. Unjust, unknown, he whispers “please…” They see him….”Stupid American.” Let freedom ring, but not cry, for here freedom is stripped bare. Life wears a new face, like a gaunt grotesque mask. His goals have been altered, his future detoured. Devoured. His essence and soul turn grey like static. His heart swells, his guts filled with stress and blood, rice dances a sobering number on his sternum. He hates them. He looks to the sky, the same sky he gazed upon from his bedroom window at home as a boy. Wonders of what he’d be when he grew up...he never imagined it would be this. His soul is in shock from what he’s seen, he had never seen evil, naked and complete, raw, unrelenting.He now stares it in the face daily. This will change who he is forever. His mother dies a thousand deaths every day he is there. She regrets having sheltered him trying to protect him from the evil in this world and now he is clueless in the grips of the devil himself. Their leaders will pay for their grandeur, their deceit and their brutality for they know better, yet they are young still, and though decorated, they must not remember...Nagasaki. Let Freedom Ring, and feel free, to be brave. This too shall pass….his soul longs for him to keep quiet and never speak of this place of this inhumane wretched existence...his soul answers … but I have too much to declare.