Remembrance in Red
We plant the poppies
by the zinnias,
by the fence that leans south
like it’s tired too.
They don’t ask much -
just dirt,
a little sun -
but they come back every year,
like they know
we need them to.
Red.
Too red for joy.
Too red for anything
but memory.
But, some things
the ground won’t forget,
no matter how deep
we dig.
I’ve seen that color
in desert sand,
in dust that clings
like guilt.
Iraq.
Kuwait.
Men saying goodbye
without knowing it.
At night,
when the city sleeps,
their faces rise -
not ghosts,
just men
with unfinished voices -
too far to hold,
too close to forget.
When the poppies bloom,
they bloom like truth,
like what we never said
in time.
We don’t plant
for show.
We plant for belief,
for the names
the wind still calls.
And still they rise...
those red, stubborn blooms -
for the men I knew,
and the ones I didn’t,
and all the stories
the earth still holds
like breath.
GBS
2018
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