A Ride Home On His Final Leave

Bus windows are huge sunglasses,
No need of them, it is raining
And they tint the grey sky green.
Stalks of corn in passing Jersey fields
Are passing brown
Down to the earth in rain.
Few still wear
The gold-capped grins of August,
When their wetted leaves
Seemed sensuous lips.

A lonely brindled Jersey,
Hideous in her dapple of greenish-white and black,
Is mulling over the taste of autumn,
Her pale green breasts unattended.
Cudding up a mouthful of greens,
Her jaws unhinge as if in a scream,
Her bell swings in the wind,
Yet only the sound of her eyes
Reaches me as we near Newark,
Then fades with night and New York.

The green of my uniform turns black,
My gold eagle buttons seem fierce
In the passing lights of the docks,
Then their brilliance flies them
As the highway stretches into blackness.
Occasionally they hatch in brief golden flight
At the green-lamped exits.
I am relieved at the darkness,
And think only of the camouflage of greens,
The lie of youth, of my body—I am going to die.