Cycle of Operations – Joseph Sellman

Cycle of Operations

Clear front sight tip, center mass, slow steady squeeze,
Pull the trigger to the rear.
A sequence started a world away takes shape.
The trigger breaks, the hammer falls, the pin strikes the primer.
Powder exploding violently releasing a small green tipped
Copper covered piece of lead.
It passed through the barrel, the grooves forcing it to spin.
It lessens the effects of wind and heat.
It explodes from the barrel engulfed in flame,
Green tip slicing through the air, a small trail barely visible.
Following its journey, a small disruption in a large world.
It follows its path true, across fields and grass finding its home.
Passing through linen and flesh.
Finding bone and exploding, slicing through muscles and organs
Without discrimination.

Firing, extracting, ejecting, feeding, loading, locking, firing, extracting.
The cycle continues.
A split second that time fails to notice.
Somewhere a mother cries, a wife becomes a widow,
A child fatherless.
Clear front sight tip, slow steady squeeze