It doesn’t surprise me

February 6, 2011  (I was 66)

It doesn’t surprise me

     you were the one to become a soldier

and there are a dozen more

     my mind would place in uniform

You never expressed the wish nor willingness

     but I would have guessed you sensed aroma

in the stench of heroism and duty

     Now you’ve lived long enough to taste the rust

from the rotten iron of irony

I understand the choices were few

     for all of us in the cold

We took hold of the life lies in front of us

     pulled and were pulled in return

Some got the short string

     others tangled in the knots

A few untied a packaged gift

     they assumed they deserved from birth

with that bow around their little finger