MAURICE DECAUL
IRAQI KIDS 2003
Dirty and barefoot they
Run around the battlefield, the city
Their home, unafraid they approach us
Our convoys as we blast through the city
Begging, always begging always asking for more
Chocolatay, food and sometimes money a few were
Bold, the rocks they threw at the Humvee's as we rolled through
The back alleys, the narrow streets slowed our advance to a crawl, disembark
The trucks, provide security watch the kids as crowds grow, watch for the men, the older
Ones, maybe the ones that ambushed us the night before, in these same streets, around the bend
Of the road, where Riley Sprayed fire from the SAW a few hours before, double back snatch these guys was the plan, scuttled by SSGT, who had never been on patrol, more concerned was he about taking pictures with these kids, his muscles he showed, unaware that we were being followed
that the kids were being used as a veil to hide the movements of the men mixed into
the crowd, was this guy really in the infantry? Luckily nothing bad happened, all the
signs existed, a real slaughter it would have been if a gunfight we got in, back
at the museum our new home, lived a family two daughters, no veil's no
burqaa's to shield their face, away some of the guys would sneak
to plead their case, many gifts they would take out of the wire
the concertina wire never really kept them away, the people
would skirt the outside talking, a "Swedish" Iraqi tried to
videotape the posts, over the razor wire I pulled him
on his Knees, he knelt an M16 pointed at him,
his kids cried for him, our help the people
would often seek, there's nothing that
we can do here, I would tell them
the hospital is down the road
is what I told the mother
with the baby
who was
dead.
|
