Kentucky Briar April 1975 Matthew Hamilton Huddled nurses spooled in white on a cracked sleet morning holding Winston 100s with uneasy hands mothers all of them their eyes bent to the east mourning their sons ten thousand miles away in the syrupy rice fields of Xuan Loc and me newly born nested in warm arms and a jungle of blankets. I arrived too late to take a rifle in my hands and erase what my mother never had to imagine: me in a rice field cheek by jaw with my brother our lives underneath gurgling mud. |
About the author:
Matthew Hamilton is a former Soldier, Congressional Aide, US Peace Corps Volunteer, and Benedictine Monk. He holds a Master of Fine Arts from Fairfield University and is a three time Pushcart Prize nominee. His chapbook, The Land of the Four Rivers, published by Cervena Barva Press, won the 2013 Best Poetry Book from Peace Corps Writers. He is currently the Librarian at Benedictine College Preparatory, an all-male, Catholic Military high school in Richmond, VA. |