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Standing There

I saw him there standing in line
Camouflaged, uniform pressed.
He stood with quiet confidence
and patience like the rest.

I watched him, as he didn’t know
I stood in the corner quiet.
Thinking young men like him,
fighting in the night.

I tried to envision his young face,
brown with all the sand.
Covered from the desert hills
holding a gun in his hand.

There I stood, even watching more
as he responded to the clerk
Then I thought of soldiers like him
digging holes for beds at work.

I stood there in reverence,
although he did not see.
Trying to understand the core
who volunteers for me.

I watched and on his face I saw
many who stood there too.
It wasn’t just one soldier in the boots
but many who fit his shoes.

I lowered my head and felt the moment
of the ones who already died.
The children, the loved one, left behind,
buried in pillows to cry.

He turned, a stranger all the while
and tipped his hat to go.
I prayed a quiet prayer and looked
up, smiled and said hello.

Leaving through the open doors
I was left with only my thoughts.
There is a force out there in our youth
a force that has fiercely fought

It is made up of the young and strong at heart
and trained to combat the wars.
The American soldier, with iron hands
and a kind heart that keeps no scores.

Copyright: CMM 2000

Monday is Veterans Day.

A day when all veterans are to be remembered, whether posthumously, retired, active, or reserve.   We know, we have a group of people men/women who volunteer either for a few years or a career to be a part of the world’s best defense system.  Their jobs are often politicized, criticized and optimized, for reasons taken to tables of congressman and senators and presidents.

They don’t question their assignments, and for the most part do not question the decisions of those who send them to countries all over the world.  They are often in harms way, but then again, they are often in places of the world they would have otherwise not had the opportunity.

They do not put on the uniform alone.  They have spouses and children, whom often given up quality of life, moving from pillar to post.  The children often change schools on a yearly basis and have to learn to make friends each time they change.  Inasmuch as this is anxiety for them, they are also afforded opportunities to go and see places in the world other children read about.

The years of absence upon absence endured by families and friends during uncertain times, leaves hearts filled with anxiety.  Spouses listen out for key words on the news, like a Mother’s listen for the baby crying at night.  But, the saddest of all the aspects of this high-risk career knows this particular special person, may or may not return from a battlefield alive.  Albeit, if they do, they may or may not be the same person when they do return. But, the pride they know of given in often-such austere places of their time to a country that allows every citizen a voice.  A voice each person should be able to use without retribution, insult or ostracized.  Our recent election is the prime example of :

That this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom — and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth. —Abraham Lincoln

These veterans who have served so eloquently and so bravely deserve this day and many more in a thank-you for their service.  So, if you can, and if you have a minute, on Monday 12, give a pittance of time for those who bravely said, ‘yes’, to an unknown.  The unknown is the most challenging of all, to all aspects of the soldier and their families.

God Bless America

Christine

One hand

  reaches into the coppice

    of the climb becoming a part of

         snarled quest of upward journey, footing

                         finding leverage on levels first known.  The maladriotness

                                                                                    of my steps pull and

                                                                                                          slip

                                                                                    into the summit of life’s challenges,

                                                                                      I sit, basking in the victory not even            

                                                                                                            mine.

copyright:  CMM

Her voice comes across the phone

clanging as a metal barb against a fence.

One word answers with

rushing winds made of sighs

blowing over the phone.

Her thoughts expressed with words like a

runaway train, derailing before

it makes sense.

Falling into an abyss of anger

she loses grips of resentment

held trapped in her mind and

locked behind doors of valium

and antidepressants .

Clanging, jutting, she falls into

a repetition of words without thoughts;

the monotonous voice of insanity.

©   CMM  2012

To and fro…

We made love in the rain,

as history past,

Yet, for some reason we remain.

I look to other places.

You ignore the signs,

in spite of the traces.

Time has taken

Into the shadows

the charcoal outlines; the we.

CMM

A wake of hope carries the moon’s descent

to ride off from the cold sun of winter’s promise.

Is it the cold that slows the squirrel’s journey up,

or, their strife of yesterdays’ feast of stowed summers.

The nip of hope, and the sting from the unknown

stand as cold air in a windless day of frozen temperatures.

Yet, the move of the hours will re-ignite the heavenly stars,

biding rest, to the weary feeling full of the day’s survival.

©  CMM  2012

Speckled spaces of sparse

clouds, covered captures of

shadows as shining sunset

peers in private perfection.

Lowering lights of last

twilights tempting timing

calls carefully a christened

day of dreams and doubts.

Ó   CMM   2012

Touching the ground, wet grass, and still morning.

You lie beneath my feet, feet that feel  as though

they are sinking into the very void of your presence.

Leaving barren ground to follow without you,

holy ground,  hallow feelings of yesterday.

You do not exist in temporal tomorrows of living everyday.

I kneel, to keep from swaying in the feelings of uncertainty.

I want to lie and sleep near you, to feel you again,

A fragment of time, going and gone, and soon to be gone again,

I mix the moisture of the day with the moisture of my tears.

In the passing of life as I seek to find reason.

I bow my head to pray and feel the swelling of life and death

fertilize the ground inside my grounding so that I may never forget.

copyright:  CMM  2012