Poems

ELEGY

                      i.m. C. H. G.

Who now will touch these men
and make them whole?
No one will say of this man, 'father'
or of the other, 'his father'.

He has left them speechless,
alone in the frame.
They are specimens in the cage of history.
His death makes them a death's head.

* * *

You are not with your fathers yet,
though today I uncover parts of you:

schoolboy in tasselled cap,
officer in regimental buttons,
doctor with instruments,
birdwatcher, sailor, photographer.

* * *

I have come here to continue
...