Patriotic Colors

[i.might.be.a.bit.sad]

The point of view taken (black and white) tends to undermine any points the poem might make, that is by its tone the poem prejudices the reader against the reader, unless the reader is of the same mind as the poem. It bypasses any chance to be thoughtful, or to induce thoughtfulness.  It does this by presenting the information in an angry and sarcastic tone while cherry picking only the part of the information that supports its contentions.
As the writer is 14, maybe they have yet to develop the necessary insight to not so obviously skew the information making it seem a question of right or wrong, when in actually there are a lot of grey areas in this subjects.
Despite the fact that as a counselor I worked with two groups of former military with acute PTSD for several years, I would never have known this was about PTSD had the writer not stated as much in the header (saying they are curled up in their beds does not bring PTSD to my mind). Except for the curled up part, most soldiers continue to ponder the war experience throughout for the rest of their life, especially those who had any part in killing others (and that does not have to mean directly).  
If you want to make the middle part about Vietnam, you might have a valid point. However, anytime a democratic government goes to war, the motives and justification are going to run the gamut. Why do we not have US soldiers on the ground against Daesh (ISIS) in Iraq? One of many reasons is because the politicians know that the populace is tired of war and would not support it. When we attacked the time before the public still had the memories of 9/11 fresh in their minds. Yet Daesh is a much greater terrorist threat now than al-Qaeda ever was. So there are many reasons soldiers go and die in wars, some good, some bad, many so-so and so on. To simplify it and not acknowledge the complexities is the equivalent of someone giving the rational "because I said so."   That sort of thinking in a poem is not very satisfying.  

Still, this at heart a decent idea and it would be good to keep working at it.

Best,


Dale

Dale-
Thank you for your viewpoint! I realized as i was posting it that the ideas i expressed are probably completely over simplified. I definitely don't have all, or probably any, of the true unbiased information. With that in mind, i am very, truly sorry that i said untrue things about any mental illness, as i know how i feel when people do that about my own. Thank you for explaining some of the real facts to me, i definitely needed it and certainly appreciate it.

thank you,
Liz