On the Front Lines

part of the book i'm working on about video games. i hope this is the only poem written about Medal of Honor: Frontlines

In a world changed in the blink of an eye,

the willingness to take up arms

against my fellow man

may have appeared monstrous to most,

but there was certain justification

to knowingly stand on the side of good

and point an assorted number of gun barrels

at the perfect blue eyes staring back.

 

The day before the last fathers’ day noticed:

The South-American beauty

Charmed me away from my cigarettes and soda

To a cathedral’s wailing bells

And the land where my bosses father-in-law

Wandered the earth in a skin tight polo

And polyester khaki shorts,

Yet even the near imminent promise of sex

With an exotic beauty

Old enough to know how it should be done

Could not keep me away

From a rumbling black controller

Shaking with each blast on the shores of Normandy.

 

The last true summer

Before the point of no return

When hours could still be whiled away

On electronic boxes shooting out bright lights.

A European campaign

Taken from the finest hour

to all the battles beyond.

A perfect world

Marked perpetually by war

Where all the deficits of my flesh

Were perfected in the form of a hero

Who I could only claim to be

When the green power light was shining

In the shadows of my room.