Do you know your ancestors’ scars
like the caterpillar-shaped indent
on your left thigh? The brown
of your grandfather’s eyes lives
in your mirror. You see
what he saw
in Germany but never spoke
of. The red, the sound
a body makes when it hits
the ground.
You’ve never met the man
but his eyes look at you every day.
When Dad hands you a .22 rifle
for a second
the targets are more
than targets.
What that 18-year-old
could never unsee echoes
in my 18-month-old nephew’s
eyes. Grandma points at his left thigh
on a Wednesday morning.
“That’s where your Pap was hit
with shrapnel.”
A caterpillar scar.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
I once saw a set of quad tracks heading across a frozen dam. The tracks led in but never reached the other side. There was no sign of broken ice.