Confidence and tail guns
Are all he possessed.
An alien land with alien air;
He invaded with the confidence
Of a young man fighting for ideals.
A glass bubble
Would either be his coffin or his throne.
Tail guns would decide.
He smiles at me from seventy years back.
Like a letter from the front, I can see the old man who will meet me at the door with a quarter and a hug.
He is dressed in full flight uniform,
Standing between his high-caliber angels.
I see my Papa, my father, myself, and my son
In one photo of one young man.
He flew to hell and back
In a transparent sarcophagus
While my father was not yet real,
And I was nothing but a distant thought.
I feel closer to him because of this picture;
This photo of a young man
With tail guns and confidence
Is my window.
He is my Papa
Speaking across the decades, smiling in the shadows, and keeping me company in the middle of death.
