ORIENTATION

You report in under the harsh
glaring lights of Fort Maternity’s
orientation center with the
busload of other little baldies

all recoiling from the sudden 
slap of culture shock, petulant
draftees like yourself assembled
into the ranks and files of uniform

clear-plastic ‘cots’... you get your
physical, your shots, your standard-
issue Huggies, and are summarily
moved out to your unit, that squad

of squabbling siblings who outrank you,
to learn the chain of command, the
naming of parts, the S.O.P.’s, and
The Mission: namely, the good soldier

embraces his responsibilities
to himself and others... or else
life’s just a bitch and then you die...
it’s all very BASIC...

and when you finally become
the ‘short-timer,’ facing that
Big Discharge in the Sky as
everyone does eventually

it will probably come as
little surprise when The End
(like all the endings
that came before)

     turns out to be just another
     commencement exercise