What do you think?
Rate this book
Small Wars Manual: Poems
"Small Wars Manual is a masterpiece, one of those books I read and know at once I’ll be coming back to the rest of my life.”—Kaveh Akbar, author of Martyr!
From award-winning poet Chris Santiago, a far-reaching collection of erasures and original poems examining the long shadow of American militarism and imperialism.
Stemming in part from a disturbingly mundane military document of the same name, Small Wars Manual is a how-to for imperialism that critically dismantles itself with each passing line, “a pidgin // containing elements // of animus and // insubordination.” In its wake, the very boundaries of oppression and resistance, art and justice, and power and truth are exploded.
Highly conceptual yet gut-wrenching, this meticulous and visionary masterpiece of erasure poetry and other forms sinks into the cold mechanics of American warfare in the Philippines and Vietnam to reveal a brutal rhetoric. In more autobiographical sections, Chris Santiago’s own Filipino immigrant background reveals hard-lived experiences, where “stars can guide // either bayonets // or refugees” and “even small wars waged // on the living room floor” cause trepidation and harm.
This righteous collection redeems the vulnerable from the aggressors—empire, army, their systems and tools—and transforms everything in the process. In the hands of Santiago, the deconstructive becomes the eviscerating, condemning all wars that upend countries and mark generations. Here are shining poems that make shelter of chaos, by one of the most skillful and intrepid poets writing today.
From award-winning poet Chris Santiago, a far-reaching collection of erasures and original poems examining the long shadow of American militarism and imperialism.
Stemming in part from a disturbingly mundane military document of the same name, Small Wars Manual is a how-to for imperialism that critically dismantles itself with each passing line, “a pidgin // containing elements // of animus and // insubordination.” In its wake, the very boundaries of oppression and resistance, art and justice, and power and truth are exploded.
Highly conceptual yet gut-wrenching, this meticulous and visionary masterpiece of erasure poetry and other forms sinks into the cold mechanics of American warfare in the Philippines and Vietnam to reveal a brutal rhetoric. In more autobiographical sections, Chris Santiago’s own Filipino immigrant background reveals hard-lived experiences, where “stars can guide // either bayonets // or refugees” and “even small wars waged // on the living room floor” cause trepidation and harm.
This righteous collection redeems the vulnerable from the aggressors—empire, army, their systems and tools—and transforms everything in the process. In the hands of Santiago, the deconstructive becomes the eviscerating, condemning all wars that upend countries and mark generations. Here are shining poems that make shelter of chaos, by one of the most skillful and intrepid poets writing today.
144 pages, Paperback
Published April 15, 2025
34 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
October 8, 2025
pyromancy divination through fire
macharomancy divination with daggers and swords
extispicy interprets the remains of sacrificed animals
nggam the unrest of spiders and crabs
skatharomancers observe the rooting of beetles over the graves of the murdered
-- "5.3 (Initial Operations: Military territorial organization)"
If being
is a refuge
from nothingness
then war is the establishment
of a neutral zone
-- "5.1 (Initial Operations: Neutral zones)"
I carry the Midwest inside me
like a field in which a woman has fallen down
the counties rippling outward
like the opposite of a blast radius
or its homograph.
-- "Boondock Suite"
a drone pilot might
observe a target for months
might watch him grieve
cheat and practice
penalties with his kids
then one day when
the conditions have all been
met you kill him
you watch the death
you even follow the body
to the burial ground
and kill the gathered mourners
-- "9 (Aviation)"
My children
have never seen war.
It is also true
that they have never lived
without it.
-- "4.5 (Training: Training programs and schedules)"
Inland are cities of light
sprawling machines
that can traverse the past.
By means of light, one can
touch the beginning of
time itself: It is a column
of fire, impenetrable, bent
to the body like an opera
containing the sea,
the rolling sea minus
the gondolas. The engine
is made of singing.
-- "5.2 (Initial Operations: Movement inland)"
macharomancy divination with daggers and swords
extispicy interprets the remains of sacrificed animals
nggam the unrest of spiders and crabs
skatharomancers observe the rooting of beetles over the graves of the murdered
-- "5.3 (Initial Operations: Military territorial organization)"
Men
should not sleep well on ground
tilled with lashings and hangings.
-- "6.5 (Infantry Patrols: The march)"
If being
is a refuge
from nothingness
then war is the establishment
of a neutral zone
-- "5.1 (Initial Operations: Neutral zones)"
I carry the Midwest inside me
like a field in which a woman has fallen down
the counties rippling outward
like the opposite of a blast radius
or its homograph.
-- "Boondock Suite"
How terrible if everything has
a soul -- how much more
to answer for
-- "Hitler Moves East"
you see now that war is sorcery
I do not mean witches
I mean it is made
in the dark
the ancient
forest
like the first
murder
like the slow rounds
of faeries
a forge
siring
forges
-- "Small Wars"
scatter violets
on the graves of enemies
-- "6.10 (Infantry Patrols: Stratagems & ruses)"
a drone pilot might
observe a target for months
might watch him grieve
cheat and practice
penalties with his kids
then one day when
the conditions have all been
met you kill him
you watch the death
you even follow the body
to the burial ground
and kill the gathered mourners
-- "9 (Aviation)"
My children
have never seen war.
It is also true
that they have never lived
without it.
-- "4.5 (Training: Training programs and schedules)"
Inland are cities of light
sprawling machines
that can traverse the past.
By means of light, one can
touch the beginning of
time itself: It is a column
of fire, impenetrable, bent
to the body like an opera
containing the sea,
the rolling sea minus
the gondolas. The engine
is made of singing.
-- "5.2 (Initial Operations: Movement inland)"
April 28, 2025
A-MA-ZING!!! Many of the poems are erasures of the United States Marine Corps ‘Small Wars Manual,' and they approach erasure in a way that is meaningful and unlike most other erasure poems I've read by others. The collection addresses the topic of American and Spanish colonialism/imperialism, especially the effects on the Philippines.
October 20, 2025
A really compelling collection of poems about US and Spanish imperialism (mostly in the Philippines). Some of the erasure poems feel a bit formalistic, but overall this collection transcends some of its formalist tendencies and is also fantastic at integrating historical elements.
November 1, 2025
A collection of poems that punch below the belt. Building on the "White Man's Burden" fugly dirty little imperialistic war around 1899 in the Philippines with black Buffalo soldiers being racially stereotyped as immune to jungle diseases, and water boarding known then as "the water cure" using dirty water to make it more lethally painful and a general who executes every male over the age of 10 years and gets a slap on the wrist and you see the roots of today's militaristic society.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews