On Armistice Day – remembering those for whom it came too late – and their families, for whom life was never the same…
Night Flight
Lord, I’m not yet twenty,
My brother only twenty-three;
if one of us must die tonight
let it not be he!
Or me…
Yet there the crescent moon
rising gold above the land
cradles the ghost of another;
one reborn, one dying
in the arms of a brother,
a sign of things to be..?
He led me by the hand
once when lost and small. I understand
the call for sons, while grieving mothers
listen to our planes climb high,
and fathers pace – and loving others;
my girl who kissed me, smiling still.
I promised to come back. Some day I will.
But not tonight. The woods below
are where my pup and I grew up. We owe
that old dog, whining in his sleep
our childhood days. Three pairs of eyes
on silver moving in the stream.
What does he dream?
Do owls still keep
the twilight watch below?
I see our fields are white with snow.
But dark shadows now streak by…
Keep them both safe, Lord;
let them go free.
If one must go, take me.
*** Amy Brooke