F-14s Over Mesopotamia

Between the two rivers, not far from a garden, two trees
where it all began, a scribe is lining the first poem.
Tell me everything you wish. I’ll write.

Cuneiform marks, stick wedging mud, clay fired to count
pelf, wealth, the sheep of us. My gains abrade me. What
I own is mine to lose, ram by ram, bull after bull.

The Marines de-mined, secured the port, oil fields
to south and north, pounded the Republican Guard sent
from Baghdad by fleeing generals. The B-52’s broke

the teeth of ancient dead. The museum was left to looters,
who took art more precious than bones, which anyone
can leave behind. Mona Lisa of Nimrud,

ivory lips and eyes. Uruk statuette in skirts embroidered
with heaven, her face a circle of astonishment, as if she
can’t believe the savagery of JDAMs, RPGs, even after eons

of invasion, Hittites, Assyrians, Mongols, impunity
of remote control, writers embedded in invading units,
bonding with high-fiving leathernecks. Get some, boys!

Abrams tanks and Bradleys foul desert, fire falling
from the stars as white, crew-cut gods sow hell
among dark ones scurrying like roaches

along the baseboards of killing boxes. Where
scribes once counted stars, no innocence at all,
Nimrud’s Mona Lisa missing and presumed lost.