How I long for the nights when safe in my bed
When I believed a benign star shone down
Before my dreams were tattered to shreds
By the heat and flies of Al Amarah town.

Now mothers in Iraq who curse my name
Weeping at a dusty grave for a mangled son.
Rejoice that my hero lives with guilt and shame
And his mother wishes his bloody duty undone.

They slapped his back, called him lionhearted.
But failed to see the doubt locked deep inside.
That questioned ending lives barely started.
He cried within, for heroes must be dry eyed.

This mother questions the validity of a war
That’s given her a son who smiles no more