April 1969Week Fifteen: 204
There’s something tidy
in seventeen syllables,
a haiku neatness
that leaves craters of
meaning between the lines but
still communicates
what matters most. I
don’t have the time or the space
to write more, so I’ll
write what needs to be
remembered and leave it to
you to fill in the
gaps if you feel like
it. In 1968,
sixteen thousand five
hundred ninety-two
American soldiers died
in Vietnam, and
I’m dedicating
one syllable to each soul
as I record my
own losses suffered
in 1968, a
year like no other.
_______________________
January 1968
Week One: 184
The trouble started
on New Year’s Eve when Mom came
home late. Way too late.
Worry about Mom—
and about Dad—knotted my
gut while Dad paced the
living room like a
panther ready to pounce. “Where
the hell is she, Ashe?
Those damn activists . . .
I shouldn’t have let her go.
Well, that’s the last time,
the absolute last
time she mixes with trouble-
makers. It ends now!”
He looked at me like
it was somehow my fault, but
I knew better. He
had to blame someone,
and I became an easy
target. But it made
me angry at him—
and at Mom, too. Why couldn’t
they just get along?
What I wished for the
new year was peace at home, in
Vietnam, and the
world. A normal life.
Was that too much to ask for?
The door creaked open,
Mom stepped in, and Dad
pounced. I crept up the stairs, closed
my door, and tuned out.
? ? ?
Later, Mom tapped on
my door and came in, timid
as a new kid late
to school. And she smiled
even though she’d just had a
knock-down, drag-out with
Dad. There was a light
in her that I hadn’t seen
in a long, long time.
She wanted to check
on me, to make sure I was
okay, to tell me
that May 17,
1951, was the
best day of her life
because it was the
day I was born, and even
though things had been rough,
she had no regrets.
Not one. Then she hugged me and
whispered that maybe,
just maybe, there was
light at the end of this dark
tunnel. “You never
know what’s coming up
the hill,” she said, then left me
alone, worrying.