line ab have net berm aiduseb.
" The youth [Story]
has an I.Q. of 61. There is no indication in
the file that even a preliminary investigation
was conducted.
The center received a letter from the mother of
a youth stating that "a white female guard
forced [her son] to remove [his] shirt and slith-
er like a snake a long distance."
A counselor filed a complaint that she wit-
nessed an officer falsely charging a youth with
masturbating and giving him a ticket while
stating, "You try to beat that, motherfucker."
Nine youths wrote a statement "reporting Sgt.
JB for eating off our trays ever sigal dining hall,
one time sgt jb took two trays ... he taks pepos
snaks and saying we have no more but i saw
him ... and he said 'Sgts. come first.'" The
grievance was rejected because the youths did
not start their statement with the phrase "this
is a request for administrative relief."
A youth put a belt around his neck and tied it
to his intake cell door. He was sprayed with a
"one-second burst of Freeze Plus." A discipli-
nary report was written up in which he was
found "guilty." Later he cut his wrist, for
which he was issued a disciplinary ticket. Use
of tickets in such clinical situations is anti-
therapeutic.
A youth alleged that he had been "choked out"
and raped. His medical file states, "It appears
that he is being victimized by some of his
peers." He cut his forearm with a belt buckle,
for which he was sentenced to fifteen days' loss
of both canteen and telephone. Later he did
self-harm to his testicles "in order to be housed
in medical," for which his sentence was thirty
days' loss of canteen. One self-harm episode
was documented by photographs of the youth
lying naked on the concrete floor of a cell, his
hands behind his back, blood spattered on rhe
floor and door.
A tear-gas grenade was released in an en-
closed dormitory area, despite warnings on the
grenade stating "for outdoor use only. May re-
lease lethal concentration indoors." Many res-
idents were dressed onlv in underwear for
sleeping and were forced' to lie facedown on
the concrete in the cold for approximately
five hours. Several youths were moved back
into the gas, purportedly to punish them for
talking, and several were sprayed with Deep
Freeze aerosol restraint, causing violent asth-
matic reactions and second-degree bums in at
least one youth.
32 HARPER'S MAGAZINE I JULY 2000
THE WOODCUTTER
By David Means, in Assorted Fire Events, to be
published in September by Context Books.
Le first day back he began chopping like a
maniac, going at the wood day and night-or so
they say. He'd been back six years when I was old
enough to notice him, and by that time he went
a bit slower (at least that's what I was told) but
still split a good cord, a full cord, in about two
hours, depending on what kind of wood it was
and how large the tree was; he had a gas-powered
wedge that halved the logs; then he threw them
into place and took a good hard swap, usually
just one chop was all it took, and then he'd swish
them out of the way with his steel-toed boots
and do another; all day, most days, seven days a
week, barring only the worst kind of weather.
When he stopped, there were usually dewdrops
of sweat and condensation on his black beard; in
cold weather, a dangling clot of ice; in the sum-
mer, there were fine little braids of red welts un-
der the hairs and just above the skin. Prickly
heat. The lumberjack shirt he wore, traditional
red-and-black Pendleton of good wool, graced
him deep into summer. When he killed him-
self-August 1, 1985-he was in the shirt, next
to a fresh cord of oak stacked against his garage.
His wife was out there undoing the buttons slow-
ly to get to the wound, small and round, pro-
duced by a Teflon-coated bullet (the papers said)
that eased neatly into his chest and right out, the
wonders of moon-shot technology going a step
further than nonstick pans (my father muttered).
Theories abounded about the exact reason, but
suicide being an unexplainable enigma, it didn't
take much to put most of it on Nam, on his role
in the siege at Khe Sanh, on buddies lost, al-
though the papers mentioned he was being sued
for taking down a red maple on private property
without permission, going right up the [ansons'
driveway (a washed gravel loop to the front of
their cedar-sided ranch), tying a rope around the
tree, then his pickup hook, getting the chain saw
revved up, telling me to ease up on the clutch
when he gave a shout (being only fourteen, I
wasn't versed in the workings of a manual shift,
but I did as I was told, easing up slowly, and the
truck jerked back, and the tree went down be-
hind me with a loud, dust-clouded whomp). Be-
fore I was out of the truck's cab, he was slicing
into the trunk, getting right into the heart of the
tree, which was a good 120 years old according
to my ring count (later). I kept quiet about my
role in his demise. It wouldn't do to let people
know that maybe it wasn't Nam that caused him
 to shoot a nice, neat hole in his heart, and that What would Anne Marie Goldsmith
maybe it was just other stuff: the value of trees Have thought of me
being dissembled, the wonderful easing up of If instead of asking her to dance
weight when the head of the axe left the arch I had put my BAR to my shoulder
and pulled him into the chop (I'd watched a mil- And shot her in the face
lion times). The threat of not being able to go I thought about her in my foxhole-
into the yards of his neighbors, or the local parks One, in a foxhole near me, has his throat cut
where he got most of the trees, to take down ex- during the night
cess growth, was too much for him. His lumber- We take more precautions but it is night and it
jack days were numbered. is you.
The typhoon continues and so do you.
"I can't be killed-because of my poetry. I have
to live on in order to write it."
[Poem} I thought-even crazier thought, or just as
crazy-
TO WORLD WAR TWO "If I'm killed while thinking of lines, it will be
too corny
By Kenneth Koch, in New Addresses, published When it's reported" (I imagined it would be
in April by Alfred A. Knopf. reported!)
So I kept thinking of lines of poetry. One that
came to me on the beach in Leyte
Early on you introduced me to young women Was "The surf comes in like masochistic lions."
in bars I loved this terrible line. It was keeping me
You were large, and with a large hand alive. My Uncle Leo wrote to me,
You presented them in different cities, "You won't believe this, but someday you may
Made me in San Luis Obispo, drunk wish
On French seventy-fives, in Los Angeles, on You were footloose and twenty on Leyte
pousse-cafes. again." I have never wanted
It was a time of general confusion To be on Leyte again,
Of being a body hurled at a wali. With you, whispering into my ear,
I didn't do much fighting. I sat, rather I stood, "Go on and win me! Tomorrow you may not
in a foxhole. be alive,
I stood while the typhoon splashed us into So do it today!" How could anyone ever win
morning. you?
It felt unusual How many persons would I have had to kill
Even if for a good cause Even to begin to be a part of winning you?
To be part of a destructive force You were too much for me, though I
With my rifle in my hands Was older than you were and in camouflage.
And in my head But for you
My serial number Who threw everything together, and had all
The entire object of my existence the systems
To eliminate Japanese soldiers Working for you all the time, this was trivial. If
By killing them you could use me
With a rifle or with a grenade You'd use me, and then forget. How else
And then, many years after that, Did I think you'd behave?
I could write poetry I'm glad you ended. I'm glad I didn't die. Or
Fall in love lose my mind.
And have a daughter As machines make ice
And think We made dead enemy soldiers, in
About these things Dark jungle alleys, with weapons in our hands
From a great distance That produced fire and kept going straight
If I survived through
I was "paying my debt I was carrying one,
To society" a paid I who had gone about for years as a child
Killer. It wasn't Praying God don't let there ever be another war
Like anything I'd done Or if there is, don't let me be in it. Well, I was
Before, on the paved in you.
Streets of Cincinnati All you cared about was existing and being won.
Or on the ballroom floor You died of a bomb blast in Nagasaki, and
At Mr. Vathe's dancing class there were parades.

34 HARPER'S MAGAZINE / JULY 2000