Letters my sister sent me
just last week
from my father to his darling wife
(and that would be our mother)
sent from England
during the Second War and Germany
where he was sent
once the fighting was over
had I seen them while he was still alive
I think that he and I would have been closer
that I'd have reached out
to that dear young man
so full of life and so full of himself
who wrote with youthful love and passion
of his dreams
his hopes both for the world
and for the son
whom he had yet to meet
who by the way resisted
accepting the new order
once his dad came back
but here's a letter from Rüsselsheim in Hessen
penned on my second birthday in July
of nineteen forty-five
he's learning how to play accordion
still not knowing when he'd make it home
it's been three years
his eagerness is palpable
as is his sorrow for the losses that he sees
on every side
not a household in this city
he writes
that hasn't lost a father or a son
and often both
no wonder that he worked
in after years so hard to find a path
to peace among the Great Powers
to better understanding
between Russia and the West
and a rule of law
holding the Nations to account
I'm glad for him he's missing Putin's folly
and this moment
perhaps the most precarious
since the ending of that distant war