ABIGAIL B. CALKIN
Welcome Home

Onecia wept as I read my first letter
from you. "They're all the same. You
send him off. You'll welcome him home,"
said one Viet wife to another. Her husband
had fifty-four ambushes,
even more reconnaissance missions.
Who will welcome you home, Ed?
A drugstore in South Dakota that gives
free coffee and donuts to Vietnam vets--
twenty years late but better than never.

I take showers in my glasses and underwear
I brush my teeth wearing my hat, coat, and gloves
He's sixty miles away. What will I do when he goes?

You wore your two bars
I drove the '69 Camaro.
Your dog waits by the door
as Odysseus' dog waits for him.

I take showers in my glasses and underwear
I brush my teeth wearing my hat, coat, and gloves
He's sixty miles away. What will I do when he goes?

Early Sunday morning, the 410th left
flying in fishnets, silver anchovies
carried by helicopters as each two days
is three weeks long.

I take showers in my glasses and underwear
I brush my teeth wearing my hat, coat, and gloves
He's nine thousand miles away. I'll be fine when he comes home.

I met three planes. You were on the fourth.
Terri threw red, blue and silver stars on us.
In the Viet Camaro we drove through corn fields,
burned forests, Badlands and Gallatin,
down the Columbia to the Pacific that is not
and into the sage. Butte had yellow ribbons
Cpl. Nick Ouellette, Ssg. Tom Kominski, one
on each light pole, a nation absolving its soul.

I took showers in my glasses and underwear
I brushed my teeth wearing my hat, coat, and gloves
This time we welcome you home from two wars.