And it's against his religion
You do that
An to them
To these people here
You've fucked with the kid's head
An no one can
Convince that kid's mama
You didn do it on purpose.
In an enthusiastic and perceptive introduction to the book, Stanley Kunitz properly recommends that the poems be read through all in a single sitting. The growth of Casey's insights, one upon the other, the recurring juxtaposition of human comedy and absurdist tragedy, and the escalating force of Casey's convincing verse can best be appreciated when he work is taken in as a whole. Amidst what would seem to be his verbatim transcription of his portion of the war, the poet's moments of reflection are neither disruptive nor pompous, but as frugal, honest and ironic as his descriptive poetry. Somewhat misleadingly, it is his most philosophically-inclined poem "A Bummer" which appears on the front of the book; it concludes with a rare instance of generalization:
If you have a farm in Vietnam
And a house in hell
Sell the farm
And go home.
Those skeptical of Casey's craft might argue that his reliance of dialect is a mere trick, that anyone with his eyes and ears open for a few years in Vietnam could capture and same idiosyncrasies and recount the same stories, that one work is not enough to establish Casey as a poet to be reckoned with. I would disagree. If his obsession with speech patterns smacked of phoniness, the impact of his work would fade quickly. But his achievement seems more impressive upon each rereading of his book. In fact, the skill in constructing poems to intense despite their apparent simplicity belies the feeling that he has done something within any observer's grasp. By producing a compassionate work whose success in conveying the day-to-day feel of the Vietnam experience is so unique, Casey has indeed earned a place as a poet to be watched.