Poems track trauma

I guess I missed this but it seemed worth giving some time to none-the-less. Steve Mason, poet laureate of the Vietnam Veterans of America.

It was reported by the Veterans for Common Sense.

This stuck out:

He banged them out, some in single sittings, on an old Underwood typewriter. He says he never rewrites.

"Johnny’s Song" had a first printing of 35,000, almost unheard of for a book of poetry. One poem, "A History Lesson," begins like this:

Since Vietnam,/ three things hold my universe together:/ gravity, centrifugal force and guilt.

The poem "The Wall Within" begins like this:

Most real men/ hanging tough/ in their early forties/ would like the rest of us to think/ they could really handle one more war/ and two more women./ But I know better./ You have no more lies to tell./ I have no more dreams to believe.