Echoes of
the Departed
As the Spanish
moss billowed
rain clouds exposed some truth.
We heard once again
the rumbles of cannons,
the cries of dying men
echoing from the Battle of Port Royal.
They howled into-the-night
like Gettysburg ghosts.
Why do some
sounds of history never find their way
but linger amongst the air
reminding us they were once there?
When the rain
began,
the voices stopped-perhaps the men of battle were thirsty.
Grackles noisy and evil eyed
froze in the summer storm,
terrapins found themselves sunless;
I watched you count their years in diamonds.
That night as
the pines drank
all they had been supplied
I thought back to the day we first heard those
echoes
echoes
voices of the dead.
I let out a
wail and
to only the moonlit nightlight
I told my story aloud.
Perhaps you'll hear it some day
floating helplessly,
lost in the answerless sky;
questions only the past will ever see.
In the wind
I shall listen for yours,
and love you still
for secrets that only
time will tell.
