Strange Army Exercise

[Jim Valvis]

Strange Army Exercise


The nuclear war exercise in basic training was an odd one.
You stood in a sand box as the drills flashed a spotlight
directly into your eyes and you were supposed to grab
your nuts and fall in the sand face first like shot dead.
The drills never said why we needed to grab our crotches,
as if they’d suddenly become the most important things
left in the universe with everything else going to hell.
Or maybe it wasn’t our jewels at all but instead our hands.
Yes, that must have been it, the hands had to be saved
and being practical the army knew where nature designed
the safest place on the male body, between the two legs.
It’s possible even both were meant to be saved. Not sure.
And I wasn’t going to draw attention to myself by asking.
So anyway we lined up and took turns in the sandbox.
This was one of the few drills I knew I wouldn’t bungle.
Surely even an ate-up airhead like me could grab myself
and fall forward and not make an embarrassing mistake.
And then I didn’t. I got through that one without a hitch,
and all of the guys patted me on the back as we moved on
to the other exercises that were a little more complicated.
So rest easy that if we ever have to stare down an H-bomb
PFC Valvis is good to go; there’s even a check on a sheet
filed away in the archives at Fort Jackson, South Carolina,
that acknowledges in the face of nuclear holocaust I’m ready.
I’ll be among the few stumbling in the black wintry nothing
with two functioning hands and a perfect set of sterile balls.

[Ron Androla]

ha. what about radiation-proof cups? lead gloves?

[Jim Valvis]

Sadly, Ron, those aren't standard government issue.

Hell, I would have been happy with a pair of boots that fit.