A web site that shares the emotional and spiritual experiences of the Vietnam War through poetry, stories, and photos by combat veterans.

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Billie Joe
by Robert H. Dirr Jr.


Sploshing through brown, leach blighted waters of a rice paddy,
My friend opted for an easier route.
He plodded onto the drier dikes and made it halfway across,
And disappeared in a puff of black smoke.

Someone yelled "Corpsman!" and I skipped over sprouts of green
To a new moon crater, still forming.
I could not find his body and jumped into the liquid soot
Of hot water and searched for Billy Joe.

Shark teeth raked my arm and I grabbed the rest of his leg,
And the lifeless friend floated upwards.
The bright sunlight proved the shark to be splintered bone, and
The scratch and whiteness still awaken me.
 #

©1997, All Rights Reserved

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