Joey Hall

Green grass and children; All that remains of warriors's dreams.-BASHO I am a constant soldier and sometimes poet. When I grow old, I'll probably be that crazy old man who lives in the desert howling at the moon. I like long walks through the Afghan mountains and long drives through the Iraqi nights. I am a warrior. I'm that guy in the picture in the uniform with the rifle and the mountains in the background. I'm that guy who heard a voice asking, "Who will we send?" and answered, "If there are going to be girls, I'll go." But there weren't any girls. Damn it. My core identity is somehow tied up in this notion that when weak, frightened people call out for help, they are calling to me. When evil men feed the darkness that threatens to blot mankind from this world, it is my spear that must oppose them. I must go into the darkness and push back so that those children who will one day sing of peace and beauty in an age better than this one will not have their spirits crushed by the servants of The Adversary. This is what it means to be a warrior. But if you're going into the darkness, you have to carry your own light. The remembrance of quiet desert mornings, the smell of grass, the laughter of children, the taste of watermelon, the way a girl walks when she knows a man is watching... If you do not carry these things inside you, you run the risk of losing the vision and your purpose; finding that you do not serve...you merely fight. That you march...but do not dance. That you hate your enemy more than you love those for whom you fight. You run the risk of serving the darkness. To be the servant of truth and justice is to be a warrior. To be the servant of beauty and joy is to be a poet.