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by Cordelia Hanemann

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(“Elegy: for My Soldier Father” mobile version)

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your death went unremarked 
----until the day
----you did not speak

silk-lined casket 
-- --your dress blues epaulets medals
----you scarcely resembled yourself

those dark-rimmed glasses
----as if to see something 
----you had missed: 

the you who retired into that sad
----cramped room closed doors 
----listening to the gramophone moan

stacked beside the bed paltry paperback novels
----windows crusted over with soot 
----and stale breath

soldier—made of flesh - - - - - not tin 
----not metal - - - - -  mettle - - - a little 
----be brave - - - - - - and you were 

but not in the army-way 
----soldiers cannot cry cannot mourn 
----those they maim

camouflaged in fatigues 
----undone by the man 
----you were meant to have been

outdone - - - -- your wars killed you 
----not bullets not bayonets 
----no sir - - - - - - - - - un-kind-ness

you - - yes sir - - a stranger in your own 
------life: only liquor neat  -balm for wounds 
------forever raw

final days your eyes wide 
------with desire - -seeing - -unable to speak 
------paralyzed by the stroke of midnight.
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