Does any good poetry ever come out of combat tours?

I humbly submit a little piece for your unbiased consideration. I'm currently deployed to Baghdad, Iraq...


Death of a poem

Sometimes my pen
writing implement in olden times fashioned from
goose quills and feathery matter rushes
to compose as the bowels
heart and head and bodily dexterity
are slow in complying with such a precipitious request
how vulgar it sounds
an affront to auditory channels to spout out
i will submit a poem
as if these creations were inexpensive knickknacks to be bartered away
at the bazaar amidst shouts of rage and glee
as i walk unfamiliar baghdad streets my feet
shod in wheaten-colored boots
and cold steel clanking from my fingers with each firm measured
step
into the sun or humid conditions
as someone saw it fit to bless
us all with rain
fluid drops which transform parched sand and gritty refuse
into quicksand which never swallows you
but sullies your feet
as you traverse the concrete streets and compose mental melodramas
while you walk and stare around into the sea of faces
some benign
others mistrustful as you sincerely wish to stay poetic and breezy
while you are wanted at work to be
alert
and alive
and not writing
all the mellifluous thoughts chime and careen inside the cranium and all
you can do is watch them anxiously
hoping to catch  a few and force them
amid their loud protestations
to reside on paper
they are all gifts and i will present anyone with them
they may come and go as long as
they make someone
happy or
suicidal