Guest blogger Betty Plevney, Bravo! friend and supporter extraordinaire, muses on her memories of childhood and the Siege of Khe Sanh. Betty says that every time she tried to write this piece it wanted to come out as a poem.

Circle the Date

Red-eyed, bone tired jarheads tremble
as they sit in an outpost surrounded by
towering ridges deep in the boonies.
They do not want to die.
Not on this plateau, Khe Sanh.
Not in this country, Viet Nam.

I sit in the row next to the door, legs swinging
below my desk.  Eraser dust sifts
across my fifth grade assessment test.
I do not want to fail.
Choosing answers with care.
Choosing circles to ensnare.

I look up and catch my brother’s eye across the room.
He scrambles across a bomb-pitted field.

My brother smiles, eyebrows wiggling above thick dark glasses.
He wiggles down behind sandbags, incoming pelting the ground.

Behind him, I see snowflakes falling in thick white clouds,
pelting the windows.
He stares up at the clouds listening to his breath
in that one moment
when the chattering of explosions stops.

I turn my head, take a breath, and find the answer
to each question is complete.
My hand moves to circle the date.

His hand moves to find his legs,
his chest, his hip are no longer
complete.

Circle the date.
Sixty-six men with Bravo Company did
in early 1968.

Betty Plevney is a writer, mixed-media artist and graphic facilitator living in Richmond, Virginia. She explores the layering and juxtaposition of words, ideas and feelings in her writing, searching for the deeper meaning and textures hidden within the layers of life. She graduated from the University of San Francisco with a Masters in Writing. You can follow her musings on Twitter @BettyPlevney.