Domestic Interior

Saying Good-bye to the World War II Generation

Saying Good-bye to theWorldWar II Generation Francis was in a Japanese concentration camp for three years And he was skin and bones upon his return to L.A. And Bob stormed Iwo Jima and Okinawa andTarawa And Bill took the beach at Normandy on D-Day While my dad andWalt had it easy in theAleutians, though they were bored as heck (It was not swell) And every day, I think, growing up, my mom or dad said, We thought that war would never end! And there were all the friends of my mom who married guys Because of how they looked in a uniform. It was unwise. Francis, Bob, Bill,Walt, andWives look at the photos of my dad in his uniform. This is in the vestibule before the funeral. Their skin mottled and tan, their posture stooped, leaning on wives, or canes; Except for Francis, a runner like my father, who stands pretty tall. “You should have pictures of him running,” he says, with a mouth-and-eyes smile. My dad, the Miler. Record Breaker. My dad smiles back, he is young. He is getting married. He is a kid, twenty-one. Under the photos we put out the flag we received from the post office Because he is a deceased veteran. But the secret is, he was really no flag-waver. The army taught him he had to be his own boss. He had never thought about it before much, but then he knew. He had to be his own boss. I think he told me that every day, too. Old men, they look at the photos. We stand and talk.We look.We look at one another. I don’t even know them much. I was so much younger than my sisters and brothers. I was the kid at the tail end, as late middle age crept in. 13 They are grandfathers, great-grand-men. Not much can they hear, or see, the lights are too dim; Their bodies carrying them past ninety soon enough. The war they fought Is not the war the grandchildren and the great-grandchildren and the greatgreat will fight. It’s time— So they lay down their arms, They lie down in their beds. Quietly, Without complaint, they go as they went marching into battle. Behind the hospital bedside curtain we close their eyes. 14 ...