Elegy for Pete

That night we drank warm whiskey

in our parked car

beyond woods now lost to the suburbs,

I fell in love with you.

What waited was the war

like a bloody curtain,

and a righteous moment

when the lovely boy’s

spine was snapped,

then the long falling into hell.

But lately, you’ve been calling me

back through the years of bitter silence

to tell me of another river of blood

and of the highland’s

howl at dusk of human voices

blasted into ecstasy.

That night in sweet Lorain

we drank so long and hard

we raised ourselves

above the broken places,

mill fires burning

red against the sky. Why

is there is no end

to this unraveling.