There are boys I grew up with
that I will never grow old with.
Who took all of their tomorrows away
because they saw no way out of yesterday.
I found my peace with their choice to leave,
through tombstone testimonies
of my own survived suicides,
and eulogies that sang praises
we never said
when they still had ears to hear.
Flowers only lay atop our final resting place.
I know the battles they fought
behind the veil of their smiling eyes,
for they looked just like mine;
and every man I have ever truly met
was a soldier fighting his father’s war.
A son made with a mute tongue,
unable to speak
the language of his own heart
until it becomes stone
and as cold as our early graves.
A brother who thinks vulnerability a weakness
at the cost of something as valueless as pride.
How I wish I could have been there in those trenches
with you during your blackest night,
when dawn seemed such an impossible distance.
With tears mercifully masked by the morning dew,
I will think of you at sunrise.
– I G