The Morgue
Morrow Dowdle
It begins with swift unease in the grocery
when he sees bright fibrous slabs of beef
stuck between Styrofoam and plastic wrap.
Artillery sounds don’t elicit a flinch, but show
a porterhouse, flank, or filet mignon—he grays
like raw steak where the blood has drained.
After Iraq, he had a tour in the morgue for bodies
back from combat—quickly opened, viscera pushed
through a grinder. The sludge packed back and sewn
into the emptied skins. Some remains so deranged
you couldn’t skim the DNA. He catalogued
possessions of each no-longer on his roster.
He leaves the military and becomes a minister.
He never eats meat, but swallows all the fears
of his faithful. He hangs them on the brittle chain
of his mind, along with dog tags, wedding rings,
wallet photos of children still bereaved, smiling
from staged backdrops of autumn leaves.
Expect to Be Deployed
Morrow Dowdle
Deploy: To spread out, utilize, or arrange for a deliberate purpose
I.
The first words you hear when you arrive on base
refer to servitude in one of two places
of the world that few Westerners
would choose to visit.
But even if you never make it to Afghanistan
or Iraq, you will be used for everything
you’re worth.
When it’s finished, you’ll wonder
where you went.
The recruiter said it was just like a job
at any other clinic. Somehow,
you believed it.
II.
When the papers come down, just the thought
of going on deployment
makes you wild.
Helpless to protest a military order
or those who fill their pockets
by sanctified conflict,
You turn aggressive on myself, fantasize
about what you’ll do to escape
the assignment:
Drive your car into a lane divider.
Fall down some stairs and break
both legs. Lift your piano
and throw your back.
You don’t want to die. Just enough hurt
to prevent hurt of a much more
serious kind.
III.
You feel most kin with what exists
at the borders of the base:
Deer that appear behind the pine stand.
Small frogs that cling to my window.
A fox occasionally shows its nose.
Airmen joke about running over groundhogs
that feed on roadside clover, the way
the bodies explode across asphalt.
When you don’t laugh, they jeer, ask
when you plan to hold the funeral.
You came to this place to serve as healer,
unacquainted with how many
shades of pain live here.
You had no idea you could disappear
as just another color.
Morrow Dowdle (they/them) is a Pushcart-nominated poet and has work in or forthcoming from New York Quarterly, Pedestal Magazine, The Baltimore Review, Poetry South, and Main Street Rag, among other publications. They host “Weave & Spin,” a performance and open mic series in Hillsborough featuring traditionally marginalized voices and volunteer as an advocate for the welfare of incarcerated people in North Carolina. A former physician assistant, they served in the U.S. Air Force in that role during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan that followed September 11, 2001. They live with their family in Hillsborough, NC.
ISSUED 