David Vancil

The Captain Who Wouldn’t Fight

David Vancil

He was slick looking, a graduate of college and OCS. He had a CIB, which means he’d seen some shit. The brass had sent him to stay with us until he rotated, two weeks to be coddled. “He’s done his part,” we’d been told. “Treat him with proper respect.”

The first thing he did was tell us the war was bad— we had no reason to be in disagreement, showing we understood. “Then why are you fighting?” he demanded. “Why don’t you tell them you quit.”

None of us said a thing. What could we reply? “We’re following orders until we can’t or die.”

He was someone with spine, someone who knew what we wouldn’t admit to. Yet, when we saw him coming, we stepped aside. He made us uneasy. He had too many questions and was much too certain.

When he departed, we wished him well. We stood by and shook his hand. No one spoke his name again.

David Vancil is retired from the faculty of Indiana State University. His work has appeared in small periodicals, critical reviews, and a few anthologies. As well, he is the author of four poetry collections. War and Its Discontents, a collection of military poems centered on family service and his own time in the U.S. Army, will be published by Angelina River Press sometime in 2022. He is at work on a collection of new and selected poems, which he hopes to publish no later than 2023. David lives in Terre Haute, Indiana, with his wife, three cats, and a dog.