I wanted to taste glory when I was young,
barely graduating but certain of my fate,
thinking life would end abruptly
like the death of childhood—
only I wanted it to end me.
But what is that except youth’s delusion?
When I finally saw blood
spill like red wine across the ground,
I could not stop staring.
The body beside it, the harder truth.
I always said deploying was easy—
dying only a faint prediction of time,
every expectation stripped away,
survival rigidly required,
laughter rising at the edge of doubt.
I didn’t expect regret to taste this way,
stuck between my teeth,
a cavity tenderly prodded,
overwhelming every flavor,
until the mouth remembers only blood.
Now I feel each death engrave my face,
every line carved with youth’s ignorance,
waves of regret crashing in,
each surge dragging me
deeper,
deeper,
deeper,
into the red oceans of my choices.
Joshua Raymond Bennett is a veteran and poet who lives in Syracuse, New York, with his son and German Shepherd, Terra. Having deployed to the Middle East, the Horn of Africa, and South America, his poetry traces the silence and internal conflict that follow war. His work is forthcoming in Constellations.