Poetry Explorer


Classic and Contemporary Poetry


HYBRIDS OF WAR: A MORALITY POEM: 3. THAILALND by KAREN SWENSON

First Line: HIS EYES WERE MADE GREEN IN
Last Line: HIS WITHIN THIS CITADEL.
Subject(s): CHILDREN; THAILAND; CHILDHOOD;

His eyes were made green in
the war that built the Burma Road,
littering dead along its verges --
discarded picnic tins.

The road has also decomposed
into the jungle's root and rains
somewhere north across the river
while here he has imposed

the order of his campaign --
a house, hoed vegetables, petals
English as Michaelmas, their beds
besieged in jungle terrain.

Unslinging packs, we rest
among his Western flowers.
Our eyes acknowledge, but don't question,
his within this citadel.



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