Untitled - July 24,2016 Poem by Bill Grace

During the roving dinner party
with food and gifts and the warm fireplace
the special operations veteran took me aside
took me to a room lined with fountain pens
confession and testimony
a story of fields of bones - die leiden menscheit
of deaths beyond its many levels
ache in a voice
pride in the history of a father's greatness.
With the close listening
something twisted deep inside
moist eyes betrayed what lips would never utter,
a moment of rare regret,
that I could not raise my arm in absolution
speak words of repatriation and reconciliation.

At home after the party
Robinson Jeffers was read
(Hurt Hawks, Shine Perishing Republic)
as penance for a fallen altar boy
who just heard his first confession
with out faculties.