No Country

To celebrate the Memorial Day weekend, I am reposting my poem "No Country", which can be found in Heavy Hands Ink Volume III.

No Country

This is no country for old men.
We prefer our heroes dead-
chopped down, bloody and hollow,
victims of their own generosity.
We mourn them, gleefully,
our pious words ignore their faults,
lift up their actions and revere them
long after their good has faded
or been exposed.
No, this is no country for old men.
We honor the dead as we spit,
emphatically,
in the faces of living, broken men:
those who did the dirty work,
who followed their leader into hell,
who marred their souls while the heroes
became sainted in death.
There is no country for old men,
and they wander with aching limbs,
they cradle grandchildren with scarred hands,
and whisper stories no one cares to hear—
No, no, this is no country
for old men.