PTSD or “Alphabet Soup” *

I have seen blood enough
Syrup thick
Warm
Stinking like copper.

I have seen brains exposed
Pale
The consistency of pasta
Splattered and smashed.
I have seen a beating heart
Cupped within a split chest
Ribs, like fingers
Stretching toward me.

Life is in the blood
Knowledge in the brain
The memory of times
Making love
Flying
Running
Every past breath
And the whole of a man
Friend or foe
Stripped and lain
Across place and time.

What is man
O, Lord
That thou art mindful
Of him?

Long after the removal
Tagged
Bagged
And dragged
In the snarl of cops
Death remains my partner.

I sleep with grisly dreams
Freely roaming my unconscious self.
I limp with memories
No man should share.
I breathe death
And am acquainted with its coarse ways.

How, then, am I to live
And what may become
Of him
Who has borne the wounded
And buried the dead?

Time
Inexorable
Will tell.

*Recently I was diagnosed with Complex PTSD.
I promise you, there is more encapsulated in
four letters of the alphabet than poetry can
possibly detail. I hope you, who know those
who suffer with this “alphabet soup” will
show them the kindness their own souls
cannot.