LOST IN IRAQ

Never free

in the arms of the ice queen,

mopping the floor

with the back of your head,

you're grinning in ecstasy and pain,

humming that tomorrow will stay away.

You're flawed

with the war in your dreams,

your old outpost still

in the mountains of the penniless,

falling forever

into her eyes,

she keeps your stick swinging,

fingers cold,

unpromising,

multicolored in the spin of your room,

your uniforms in the closet

hanging above the sniffing rats,

they snuck in

nestled in her purse,

as she steals your nobility,

snuffs out your fire.

Stephen Jarrell Williams has poems forthcoming in Aoife's Kiss, The Broome Review, REAL, Tales From The Moonlit Path, and others.