SamadhiMuse

                        On Sophie's choice

         Let me look ... let the light freeze just there
            on these love worn hands and new grayed hair
         softly now ... go and see your child
            go and look ... with your eyes that can feel and smile

         That your children, so loved, can die ... its unbelievable
            their small coats still buttoned up.
         And your wife, with her warmth at night
            and all those photograph albums shared
               and the cups she's dried with care
                  and the small wrinkles that seem to run
                     where once was young and fair.

         Go, my friend, and walk the house and touch the wood
            and sit among it ... your midnight kin
         and let the walls come round you ... and the moments wait
            while you think how frail, ...how frail is this love

         That a child, you've dressed for school can die,
            a bullet's glove, on a concrete step.
         And that the woman who's shared all those years
            can become just a statistic 
               in some foreigner's newspaper

         Some day these all, the child, warm wife, and wood
            could be torn from your page of life
         and your cups go broken ... and their skin grow cold
            while pitiless politicians
               vie for their intangible goods....

                                    Gallagher

                                    12 January 1983
                                       Dallas, TX

— Copyright 1965-2008 by Dennis Gallagher —