“Deployed troops leave shortage for Veterans Day parades”
                        -- AP News Item, November 9, 2003

The thin parade limps down the avenue.
Between the marchers, spaces open wide:
we watch the shortages of war accrue.

Their absence here lets too much light shine through –
and not just those deployed, but all who died.
The thin parade limps down the avenue

in olive drab and camouflage and blue.
And not one tank to spare for vets to ride.
The shortages of war hide in plain view.

The oil and rhetoric keep marching, too,
through this mad war’s veins, this monster that we feed.
The thin parade limps down the avenue

and Hummers idle at the Texaco,
but ration books can’t regulate this need,
and shortages don’t trouble me or you.

These are the proud, but also far too few.
Main Street’s a canyon now, and gaping wide.
The thin parade limps down the avenue;
we watch the shortages of war accrue.