EULOGY.

EULOGY
Every time I asked my dad
What it was like in the war
He sighed and muttered,
'dead men tell no tales'
I never quite got it
Never quite understood
Those five little words, spoken with such vile enthusiasm
Or the fact that he left us. Left his family.
Me.
Anyway.

My dad won the war
He was all over the news,
Face marred with scratches of battle,
Surrounded by his new family.
Body scarred with bloody wounds;
Just like the rest of them
I could have sworn it was a disguised blood pact.
A daily reminder of said new family.
Sticking together through thin.
'Those with whom you share so much in common',

and that includes the mental scars.
He once told me his blood flowed in my veins.
‘like a river, or a stream'
My geography teacher tells me rivers change course all the time.

I wonder if he knew his time with us was temporary even back then.
We lost him the night he left for the war.

'Dead men tell no tales'
Accompanied by the routine scrapping of his blade
Against whatever piece of wood he was carving
I loved to watch him create.
Reminded me of the fable, (saying or teaching, I suppose)
The potter and his clay,
He had the power to mould it,
Or let it mould.
The greatest story ever told.

Reminded me of something akin to the great rapture
Only, not the good kind (I've never been good with English)
Rapture day gone wrong
At the highest point of a cliff
We saw an angel drop from the clouds
Seemingly clipped wings followed her trail
Totally unaware of her beauty, she screamed all the way down
I know, little birdie, I wouldn't want that fate either.

Totally unaware of how shrill her scream was,
She begged for grace.
For mercy.
For redemption.
Her scream sounded familiar, intimate.
Something akin to the zoologer, wailing
Or a tortoise whose shell caught fire
Something akin to the gut wrenching wails dad makes
Every single night.