Ghost-Dog Walk with Sadie Through the Forever War
We carried a lotus moon and half of a yellow sun on our trek into the forever war. Sadie led dog soldiers down from Cold Mountain. I planted black flowers in the bend of the Burning God River. Composed garlic ballads in machine dreams. All while my spirit guide asked about a light I could not see. About the wisdom collected in the roots of the Tree of Smoke. I gambled with book thieves in camouflage on the western front. In Manassas, Remagen, Hue, and Fallujah, Sadie repeated, ”Who shot the last water buffalo? Who prospers when yellow birds no longer nest above rice beds and bean fields?” After we crossed the bamboo monkey bridge that spanned the Perfume River, I toyed with being a hero from the Good War. But disguised myself as an ardent swarm of bees instead. Sadie shimmered before fading away, leaving me beneath a constellation of ghost soldiers. I had lost touch with sand queens and dust children. Whose duty is it to to keep the sun alive? Who inherits the war that lasts forever?
Ghost-Dog Road Trip with Sadie Where We Witness the Aftermath of Squandered History
The ghost of my white German shepherd quotes Neil DeGrasse Tyson as I steer our sturdy Silverado into the American dust. “If we have the technology to terraform another planet, then we have the technology to terraform the Earth back into Earth.” Throughout the arid lands, isolated walls loom along the horizon and in random spots on the edges of wilting rye fields. Sadie sleeps through the long stretch from Sweetwater to Laredo. We carry water and fuel in the bed. For hours I steer without seeing a flower. Or a color that might remind me of the woman who wore sandalwood perfume and shared red licorice with me. On Majuli Island Jadav Payeng planted trees for forty-one years. Seiel Toyama brought green to the desert of Engebei. I know little about acacias and date trees. About watering and nurturing a tree on the border of desolation. I couldn’t keep inkberries alive in my backyard. And neglected a viburnum. I’m the sort of man who couldn’t eat strawberry licorice for love. My spirit-dog awakens beside me. Wags her tail against the gear shift. I remember how oil derricks resembled tyrannosaurs at twilight during a spring-break road trip across Kansas. Now the hulks of pick-up trucks appear in front of solitary houses like triceratops herds grazing on a memory of ferns. No buzzards perch on the longhorn hood ornaments. No armadillo roadkill lies scattered about on the berm. Around us the radio stations surrender their God-guns-and-guts bluster to the static of empty spaces. While riding shotgun, Sadie watches dust roll through the heat rising from the highway, the latest omen from a squandered history. She says, “Astrophysicists say we are down to our last one hundred years.”
Ghost-Dog Walk with Sadie after the Apocalypse
Sadie, my ghost-dog, waits on Eternity Road between Babylon and the Afterland. We survived the end of the world in a country of ice cream stars, paid our dues as heroes and villains, and wintered in the shelter of a witness tree, until only wild things were left and the dog stars could deliver a soft rain. Now my spirit dog wonders whether androids dream of electric sheep. I remind her I posed as a green priest whose gospel lifted up the Wild Horse Woman while I deposed a wayward saint. Around us, October settles in the earth. Lake shadow creatures sing of darkness and dust, and war girls gather in the Forest of Hands and Teeth. Sadie waits on Hollow Kingdom Road where I carry The Book of the Unnamed Midwife, a safe passage token for the last of the dream walkers. The last of the searchers on the border of a dark frontier. Sadie says the world must be remade by hand. In the morning, Sadie waits for me before she drafts new maps for our cloud atlas. My ghost-dog sketches glimmerings on the survey margins, pointing her compass north from our blighted station to whatever is left beyond the sunless sea.
Credits for Ghost-Dog Walk with Sadie Through the Forever War
The Forever War, Joe Haldeman
The Things They Carried, Tim O’Brien
The Lotus and the Storm, Lan Cao
Half of a Yellow Sun, Chimamanda Ngoni Adichie
Dog Soldiers, Robert Stone
Cold Mountain, Charles Frazier
The Black Flowers, Howard Bahr
A Bend in the River, Libby Fischer Heilmann
Burning God, R. F. Huang
The Garlic Ballads, Mo Yan
Machine Dreams, Jayne Anne Phillips
All the Light We Cannot See, Anthony Doerr
Tree of Smoke, Denis Johnson
The Book Thief, Marcus Zusak
All Quiet on the Western Front, Erich Maria Remarque
Who Shot the Water Buffalo, Ken Babbs
The Yellow Birds, Kevin Powers
The Milagro Beanfield War, John Nichols
Monkey Bridge, Lan Cao
Perfume River, Robert Olen Butler
Hero of the Good War, Nick Goulding
The Ardent Swarm, Yamen Manai
The Beekeeper of Aleppo, Christy Lefteri
Ghost Soldier, Elaine M. Alphin
Sand Queen, Helen Benedict
Dust Child, Nguyen Phan Que Mai
To Keep the Sun Alive, Rabeah Ghaffari
Inheriting the War: Poetry and Prose by Descendants of Vietnam Veterans and Refugees, Laren McClung, Editor
Credits for Ghost-Dog Walk with Sadie Through the Apocalypse
The End We Start From, Megan Hunter
Eternity Road, Jack McDevitt
Alas, Babylon, Pat Frank
Afterland, Lauren Beukes
We Survived the End of the World: Lessons from Native America on Apocalypse and Hope, Steven Charleston
The Country of Ice Cream Star, Sandra Newman
Heroes and Villains, Angela Carter
The Witness Tree, Brendan Howley and John Loftus
All Things Left Wild, James Wade
The Dog Stars, Peter Heller
“There Will Come Soft Rains,” Ray Bradbury
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, Phillip K. Dick
The Green Priest, Ryan Law
Saint Leibowitz and the Wild Horse Woman, Terry Bisson and Walter M. Miller
October in the Earth, Olivia Hawker
Creature of Lake Shadow, Michael Cole
Darkness and Dawn, George Allan England
Dust, Hugh Howey
War Girls, Sochi Onyebuchi
The Forest of Hands and Teeth, Carrie Ryan
Hollow Kingdom, Kira Jane Buxton
The Book of the Unnamed Midwife, Meg Elison
The Passage, Justin Cronin
The Last Dreamwalker, Rita Woods.
World Made by Hand, James Howard Kunstler
Cloud Atlas, David Mitchell
Glimmering, Elizabeth Hand
Far North, Marcel Theroux
Station Eleven, Emily St. John Mandel
Down to a Sunless Sea, David Graham
More Sadie poems are available at Unlikely Stories Mark V.
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