Reading The Names

I saw the name Moreno on the list of names
of those whose died in Iraq since last April
an update giving more than statistical sterility
to the soldiers dead for the arrogance and
mongering of a Texas playboy and his pals.

I saw the name Moreno and remembered
the smiling couple who met me on my first
week at Fort Lewis, while still cramped into
the guest quarters awaiting base housing
only because of the child growing inside me.

The wife was named Virginia. She had dark hair
and a round face filled with the smile of one who
travels at the army’s whim. Her kind husband was
some kind of sergeant. The ranks confused me
with their layers of numbers and classes. I knew

We were at the bottom of whatever ranking
the military handed out, already busted for
the larking on the coast when faced with a third tour
back in the steaming fetid country that was the current
exercise in imperial obliviousness. The Morenos

Took us into their home and she gave me all
her maternity clothes and newborn baby clothes, blue
terry cloth sleepers and chamois soft cloth diapers
all ready to cradle my new child as her toddler
orbited around us laughing. I saw the name Moreno

On her husband’s jungle green uniforms, on the nametapes
sewn to his chest. His first name was Clarence. Strangers
named Moreno gave me comfort in the far northwest
as we made the transition into the Third Armored Calvary,
stalling till our baby could be born in the hospital shared by

Both army and air force, built so long ago it was
all sprawled out on one floor like a mutant spider
sprouting in every direction just in case the enemy planes
reached across the Pacific and bombed the place
all would not be lost, just a branch or two, an arm

Or leg. Keep the losses to a minimum, that’s the way
they do it then and now. The Morenos were there for me three
decades past and now come popping back into my head
as I read the too long list of names dead in the desert,
reminding me of when the Third Cav was relocated to the base

In Texas and all the camouflage was changed to desert beige
and brown indicating a change in fashion for projected targets
and geographic future arenas of engagement. Morenos – just
one more name from my past projecting itself into the present
giving me pause as I try to remember the names of their

Children, hoping this solider was not their child,
as if
that would make the loss any less tearful
any less
the loss that tore some mother’s heart out.


5-28-05