Pansies, Tulips, Sunflowers, and Daisies

You were nineteen that summer

Your eyes trapped rainbows

Your words leaked sunsets

 

Mother cried when you left

She didn’t know if her baby would come home

Mothers are not supposed to purchase

Their child’s gravestone.

 

You called

As often as you could

You told me

As much as you could

 

I asked if you still kept your bible

Under your pillow at night

You said you didn’t believe in God anymore

God had no place with you like he had before.

 

You would tell me their names

And ages

 

You said Mark was twenty-four, and Patrick was thirty-three

You told me one man Joseph was only nineteen

So I wondered if Joseph had a baby sister like me

Crying because Brother Joey wasn’t coming home.

 

I apologized to you for everything I’d ever said before that day

That didn’t sound like something Jesus Christ himself would say.

 

You showed me

How you kept track of these deaths with a knife to your wrist

I told you they looked like train tracks

And all I wanted to do was press my ear to your arm

To hear if the train was coming

To take you home.

 

But that train didn’t come for another two years

And by that time your ears

Were polluted with gunshots

Your eyes trapped bloodbaths

Your words leaked

Death.

 

Mother was crying because you made it home alive

But I could tell by the look in your eyes

That not all who die

Have stopped breathing.

 

Some still have heartbeats. 

 

I asked you about butterflies

You said you wished you were a caterpillar

Because caterpillars change

You wanted to metamorph

Into something with wings

 

You screamed

Every time the phone ringed.

You said it reminded you

Of the way gunshots ring

You said you couldn’t get your ears to stop

Singing landmine symphonies.

               
I bought you a bouquet of flowers of

Pansies, Tulips, Sunflowers, and Daisies

Trying to drop a subtle hint for you to get help

I know you felt it but I knew you weren’t crazy

 

I tried singing you to sleep

But sleep doesn’t come too fast

For those whose lullabies have been

Gunshots and

Bomb blasts.

 

I said “Matthew 28:11.”

You said “No, Matthew died at 27.”

And I said no.

Listen.

Matthew 28:11

Come to me,

all you who are weary and burdened,

and I will give you rest.

I told you to come to me

And with my ear pressed

To your train tracked wrist

You finally slept and I at last heard

Your train was coming home

 

You earned my purple heart that day

For all the strength and bravery

You had shown.

Reviews

[Shep]

This is beautiful in its reality. If this is about your brother, then it does him justice. It does all Soldiers justice. Very few realize how difficult what we do can be, and how pitted our souls and minds can become from the acid that is war. We just pick up and drive on and hope time will heal all things.

Thank you. I needed this.