Reviewing the Troops in the Ruins

Abstract

Reviewing the Troops in the Ruins Jon Kelly Yenser (bio) Usually no one famous shows up in my dreams, but this time President Bush appears, his blue eyes surprising. We are walking through a stone arch into a rally where he is unwelcome. Ugly murmurs. “They don’t get it,” he turns to me, “all the hard work we do.” To cheer him up I tell a joke about my dog dragging in parts of a bird and then puking the rest on the kitchen tile. “I will gladly identify the species,” I tell him I told my wife, “if you’ll collect the bones and feathers.” He laughs in appreciation, his estimate of me risen. He asks me to sit next to him on the reviewing stand, next to the woman with knees sharp as the corners of boxes who wears a dark suit Hepburn wore as Holly Golightly. She sneers. [End Page 54] Some soldiers and some time and some weapons go by. It’s not getting any easier. Boos and catcalls. A shuffle and ruckus in the bleachers. The point is: I like him his eyes not at all what I imagined. It’s time to leave and quickly, his agents say. It’s no good being out in the open like this. And we are. I look around and note we are under the stars at Tikal, steps crumbling into the hillside. When I look back, the President is gone with all the rest. The crowd mutters, blood thrumming in the ear, this theater in ruins. [End Page 55] Jon Kelly Yenser Jon Kelly Yenser was born, raised, and educated in Kansas. He worked as a teacher, a journalist, and a fundraiser in several states before retiring to read and write in Albuquerque, where he now lives with his wife, the writer Pamela Yenser. Copyright © 2016 University of Nebraska Press