You Suffered More Poem by Willem VanVoorthuysen

After I lost you, I kept complaining
about the loneliness I felt, in spite
of all the love, concern and help
that I received from family and friends,
and even from perfect strangers...

Ex-P.O.W., but reenlisted sailor now,
I knew our women had been left
abandoned, in concentration camps,
to wait for husbands, fathers, sons,
who might some day, perhaps, return...

You were just one of them who daily,
with Johnny, our 4-year old, watched
army truckloads of lucky survivors
from enemy P.O.W. camps, and
their joyous family reunions...

I did, however never fully realize
how terrible sad you must have felt,
telling Johnny that Daddy might be
on the next truck, or the one after that,
while hiding tears of dwindling hope...

Most men in our family soon returned,
except for Johnny's very own Daddy,
so finally, with a trembling heart, you
went to look at the lengthening lists
marked 'killed or missing in action'...

My name never showed up, but
your awful agony still kept growing,
you cried, and prayed, and cried,
until that letter came, handwritten
by little Johnny's very own Dad...

I'm sorry it took me so long to fully
realize, that those months of cruel
uncertainty about my fate must have
caused you much, much greater pain
than any that I ever felt, beloved...


(March 23,2007)