[POOR HISTORIAN] In the military, when they would tie you to the fence
I mean when they would tie me to the fence
I mean when they would tie us to the fence
I mean that they would tie us to fences
and there were so many fences
because it was a military base
where they were practicing the art of borders
and walls and hells and, well, we were
left in the sun with our hands duct taped
and our mouths duct taped, but then the duct tape
was ripped off so they could pour old food left in the sun
into our mouths because it was called hazing
and it wasn’t called torture, because they called it hazing
and this way for them it wasn’t torture, but just hazing,
and the sun was an hour and the heat was a month
and the repetition was a half-decade and they owned us
because we signed paperwork saying we wanted to serve
our country, which meant that we wanted to be disrespected,
and touched
and we didn’t want to be touched
and, later, at the V.A., when I’d tell the PTSD counselor
about this, she would stamp my paperwork with the words
POOR HISTORIAN, because the denial of the precious moment
is to darken the history of our childhoods and the sun
had no shelter then and they did this for fun, no, for power
and our bodies were burnt sunburn and the mosquitoes ate
into the tomes of our bodies and I cannot sleep at night,
ever, and I cannot sleep all day, ever, and I shake like I’ve been
translated into a thousand different ghosts and
when they would tie you to the fence
I mean when they would tie me to the fence
I mean when they would tie us to the fence
I mean that they would tie us to the fences
and there were so many fences and one time they rubbed
feces into one of the recruit’s faces and there was only one of us
they killed, just one, his name Lee, and in the war there was nine more,
but this wasn’t during the war, and it was, and it wasn’t, and it was war
where you can do anything, because we were children
and the sun was the oldest man in the cosmos
and I remember when they untied me and I went back to the barracks
I looked in the mirror and I tried
to rip my teeth off, because they want to turn your life into a dumpster,
and there is no one ever in the history of my history with the V.A
where they have ever apologized, only emptying the boxes
in the closets of the disappearances of the dead, how I looked up
the list of those killed in the war and they don’t list the suicides,
as if they’re still alive, as if they’re still tied to fence,
because they are and they are and they are and we are
and I am and I am screaming for you to please cut me down . . .
Ron Riekki has been awarded a 2014 Michigan Notable Book, 2015 The Best Small Fictions, 2016 Shenandoah Fiction Prize, 2016 IPPY Award, 2019 Red Rock Film Fest Award, 2019 Best of the Net finalist, 2019 Très Court International Film Festival Audience Award and Grand Prix, 2020 Dracula Film Festival Vladutz Trophy, 2020 Rhysling Anthology inclusion, and 2022 Pushcart Prize. Right now, Riekki’s listening to “A Wish Come True” by Gavin Brivik from the Wild Indian original motion picture soundtrack. Reading and sound design by Vera Riekki Koss aka atmos.vera.
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