Lethe, After Mars

A Memorial Day Requiem

Mars does not enter loudly.
He comes as duty,
as order,
as the clean geometry
of a thing that must be done.

Then the world narrows.

A road becomes a threat.
A window becomes a question.
A boy becomes a shape
before he becomes a boy again.

And afterward,
when the guns have gone quiet,
when the body has returned
but not entirely,
Mars, in his mercy or his cruelty,
hands the soldier a cup.

Drink, he says.

Not enough to heal.
Only enough to blur.

The river of Lethe
does not erase the war.
It teaches the war
to speak in dreams,
in silence,
in the sudden hatred of fireworks,
in the long stare
over a breakfast table.

Forgetfulness is not peace.
It is a second battlefield
where memory wears civilian clothes.

Some men come home
carrying what they cannot say.
Some bury it so deeply
that even their own hearts
must kneel with a shovel.

But somewhere beneath the dark water,
the truth remains awake.

War is not over
when the empire signs the paper.
War is over
when the soul can remember
without drowning.