Rick Harrienger's poems excavate deep into the verities of the impact of war, the tearing of heart, soul, mind, and body of what comes to each of them when we send our young into war. His words speak, scream, of the real dues of war be they the physical or the invisible. He takes you on a journey of pain where the invisible wounds become the open, suppurating life choking challenges to a peaceful night's sleep, to a walk in the sun not wrapped in guilt, to desperately missing not only those who did not come home, but the forever altered self that was lost in nightmarish combat, through the nightmares that stay not only in the dark, but also in the light that has been forever diminished. Rick's words insist that those who have not 'been there' face up to the savage, lifelong demons of war that have woven their way into those who have been there.