Variation On a Theme by Gil Scott-Heron

Near midnight mid-December,
and my junkie uncle, the soldier,
sleepwalks home. Up avenues
strewn with everyday debris,
past rats he imagines man-made
and robot. In his heavy half sleep,
he palms, barely, a bone knife stolen
from the dead butcher’s meatshop.
Gris-gris against the bandits
in his head, the hounds at his heels.
There’s a rumble, now, rising
from behind the old armory.
A black chopper lifting,
lighting up the block. It hovers
like a hummingbird bred for death.
When he points it out to passersby,
they laugh or look away. He points
again, of course it’s gone. The one
good cloud he can still make out
is where his god resides. That’s
the good news. The bad news
is that his god has got three trained
snipers beaming from a rooftop.
In each one’s crosshairs, uncle soldier
ducks and staggers. Early winter,
his breath is bonedust. Decorated
war dog whose only friends are ghosts.
But even they, tonight, are elsewhere.