WHO WILL KNOW?

  (Poem)
                 

After the war

who will know

love’s defeated soldiers

or hear their songs

once laden with devotion

in the rubble and revision?

 

Where are the guides

that directed their hearts

and whispered the way?

And who will answer

the prayers behind their shields

or see the timeless hands

behind their lover’s rose?

 

Who will know

the real blood

that dries beneath the story?

Who will hear the real scream

that led both the hero’s charge

and the child within

to lose the war

and die?

                             1986