Charles Cicirella: Poetry, Voice

Charles Cicirella: Poetry, Voice

Charles Cicirella: Poetry, Voice

Photo: Official Army photographer Ron Haeberle photographed the bodies of this man and boy on the road back towards the village. In 2009, Haeberle admitted he had destroyed more graphic photos of My Lai.

Credit: Getty Images

Charles Cicirella: Poetry, Voice

Charles Cicirella: Poetry, Voice

Charles Cicirella: Poetry, Voice

Charles Cicirella: Poetry, Voice

Work begins on the demolition of a part of the East Wing of the White House on Monday in Washington, D.C., before construction of a new ballroom.

Evan Vucci/AP

Charles Cicirella: Poetry, Voice

Charles Cicirella: Poetry, Voice

Charles Cicirella: Poetry, Voice

Surrounded by the Slaughter

(For Ochs)

Hung himself in his sister Sonny’s bathroom in Far Rockaway, NY.

Someone who cut through all the noise finally succumbed to the ugly voices pushing him over the edge.

Artistic types have a penchant for violence against themselves when threading the needle with beauty begins to feel more like a punishment than salvation.

Think about Richard loading the gun with bullets and hamburgers, as the “Dust…American...Dust” was unfazed by the wind of memories.

If you’re paying attention, you can feel the slaughter following you around like the linseed oil finishing the rifle before blowing off your head and going to sleep.

The victor and the spoils reminds me too much of the tortoise and the hare, as history is misappropriated by the simpletons and the brown shirts.

Is this what a new lease on life looks like as she goes into remission and the cancer finds another human to feast upon?

He drove us to his chemo appointments. He was as strong as a log cabin built by Abraham Lincoln.

The way he held onto that Budweiser can never failed to raise my suspicions he’d live forever until he didn’t.

The slaughter summoned me from the confines of my mind.

It was no longer possible to break on through, so instead I looked up into Vincent’s “Starry Night” and was reminded that the “Lizard King” died on my second birthday.

Even crazier, I was born the day Brian Jones drowned in that swimming pool. I never knew my parents were fans of The Rolling Stones.

Charles Cicirella

7/21/2025