Is It

I’m sensing a stereotype developing

Warriors haunted with PTSD

Strike fear into their charges’ hearts,

As though the shepherds would devour

Their own lambs

I’m driven to ask

If there is not a soldier

Holed up within himself

Now, now that the champagne is quiet

And the confetti lies dead,

Unwilling to crawl out of his skull to so much

As kill a fly,

Staring out of his cells,

Thinking that to unlearn

The war in his hands

And take up gentleness again

Is not an effort more worthy

Than a quick and quiet self-violence

That might come easier than

Flaring out at an oblivious psychological trigger.