Jaquina

armies march in time, shouting and stamping into Vietnam swamps with booming voices and dirty boots. a soldier can't keep up, falls to the side in tall jungle grass and vomits out his homesickness into the damp shrubs. grenades crescendo while the American girl giggles and taps her nails on the grimy paint of the bar, chewing the toothpick of her martini. outside, leaves curl into mulch, and summer shrivels like a rotting pea pod.