Red Ball Express

Red Ball Express A. Van Jordan (bio) August 25 - November 16, 1944 Just now a silence grows too loud to ignore and I move out into the near-dark darkness, which, these days, has become my daylight, driving a 2.5 ton battalion truck to Red Ball depots to pick up gasoline and ammunition, then, ferrying them back to the 225th's positions through land mines hiding beneath our wheels and past German eyes, which illuminate the trees. This is the hell I do, my mission brings gasoline, which Clemenceau calls 'the red blood of war,' le sang rouge de guerre, like he's the one driving the gas-lit truck, Churchill says the Allies floated to victory on a sea of oil—on our flesh, he should say— through backroads where enemy fire shines like stars through black sky. Let's face it, gentlemen, it's like General Patton said, My men can eat their belts, But my tanks gotta have gas. Now, what keeps me going is the silhouette of driver John Rookard as he set out on a road to deliver supplies the night after another driver had been ambushed and killed—two tons of gasoline as his funerary pyre; it's Rookard's smile and his eyes, which don't smile, as he turns to look at me before he's fully embraced by the darkness.... The shape of him behind the wheel, burning in my eye, is everything I need to know about where I'm going. A. Van Jordan A. Van Jordan is author of two books of poems, Rise (winner of the PEN Oakland/Josephine Miles Award) and M-A-C-N-O-L-I-A (to be published in 2004 by Norton). This Ohio native teaches at the University of North Carolina, Greensboro. Copyright © 2004 Charles H. Rowell

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