Keeping the Peace

Keeping the Peace

It’s a normal day, man
I mean the unit’s all out
in full kit, keeping the peace;
body armour, microphone, helmet
got up like the space man —

all of us; Hunter, Mohawk, Hammerstein
even Sergeant William ‘Bill’ Williams, his chevrons
on the camouflage jacket —

the sun coming down hard —

holding the line at the headquarters, outside
this little school we shacked up in
trying to be friendly

and in the morning there’s the usual crowd
outside the wire, in dishdashas
raising their arms in the air, shouting

this one guy whining
like a mosquito, about the injustice
tapping Mohawk’s chest, talking in his face
going on about the destruction
the Americans have bought here

Mohawk looking down at him, not moving
his jaw set
220 lbs of muscular Christian
eye to eye with this Shiite

and you tell me what happens
something is wrong, something is occurring
out there, like a cloud has come down

Hammer’s behind me, above on the roof
his machine
more than a murderous fowling-piece, its
thorntree shadow
over us

that moment
Lieutenant Leman comes out from the office, says
“There’s something going on. The people
behind are messing with AK 47s.”
An ayatollah working his way
along the speckled line, shouting some verse
that heats up the others

something weird
wheels within wheels, that hints
on his such-and-such
we’re already under siege.

Cams and pawls
springs and sprains
the safeties go off —

feel the nerves tighten, the net
shrink, the stomach knot
rising to this, as to every, occasion —

on the Humvee, Williams
a spangle of light on his cheekbone
using his thumb to push forward the lever
on the heavy machine gun.
“The fuck’s going on out there?”
Some movement in the crowd
wolves closing on sheep

as the stones start to come over
like the first drops of rain
a half-brick bounces off the bonnet
with a scary, hollow clang

you tell me what happened next
the earth got sucked out

the big machine gun is already chuntering away
like it started itself
tearing up ragheads

the crowd are butterflies
scattering before wind

then the full firestorm starts
bullets like hail.

Afterwards I heard the captain’s voice
“You say we started it, fired on innocents?
It was a set-up, a twenty minute gun-battle
like the Alamo.”

— the buildings opposite
sparkling with gunfire
like a goddamn Christmas tree —

shake and
haft of a rattle as
the jaws haul out the cartridge
pump in a new one
explode it out
the brass shells falling
like peanuts

we couldn’t winkle them out until we put in
a full 120 mm tank shell from an Abrams
that took out the heart of the building
pulled the air out with a whump
picked em off as they ran out

the machines still
prattling in tongues
steel jaws moving
no one
who can stop them

the whole square filled with dead bodies
pieces of cloth, air thick with cordite

like that good strange smell
after a bad fuck

fainting with nausea

Williams dead, Mohawk wounded

praying to my God
that I didn’t do wrong.


© Warwick Collins 2003