Gerda’s Knife
I watched ‘Winds of War’ on TV and then turned out the light
And, on the stairs, in the dark, ascending
I saw your father’s knife as it hung in your bedroom.
Its white metal patient these many years
since another sun shown on it
in the days of the German Reich.
I could hear flags whipping, red and black,
against the green of trees
and the gray of building stones
and, for a moment, felt the eyes of countless men
as their hands caressed its handle’s symbol
and reveled in the power and purpose of a God given cause
and then, these many years later, through chances too rare to say,
I came and found it there in your room
waiting patiently through all my childhood and travels
A time machine from another land
another time
that almost changed my world
I look at old photos, black and white,
and so much time seems too stand between me and those images
but with your father’s knife
I could hear the flags whispering
in the crisp air of that unique time
and feel their dreams across the years
GALLAGHER
7 Feb 83
San Juan Capistrano
— Copyright 1965-2008 by Dennis Gallagher —
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