Generations

My Father came to me last night
Gone so many years
We sat and spoke of loving things
His smile shone through my tears

He said he knew my heart was sad
And of what was troubling me so
He said that he too had felt
These times of unending woe

I asked him why he never spoke
Of the things he’d seen and done
About the terrible dreams that haunt us now
Of friends and shipmates gone

Sixty- five men dead in one blast
Why did you not tell me of that day
Off Okinawa, May 14th
When the Kamikaze hit its prey

All I heard was how you had stayed aboard
A welder on that crew
Helping your crippled ship to port
But what else did you have to do

Those brave young men, your trusted friends
Buried in that twisted steel
Dad, it was you who found them there
Leaving wounds that would not heal

And what of you he asked
Of the things you had seen and done
You never spoke to me of such
But I understand why my son

Some things are better left unsaid
To leave them buried with the past
Those memories will never leave us
Thus in our fate we have been cast

But this is not the reason
For my coming to you tonight, my son
For I know what else troubles you
About this new tour of duty that has just begun

Your son now goes where we once had gone
To fight another foe
And I remember just how you now feel
But there is something I want you to know

He is a fine young man
Handsome, brave and strong
I know well the pride you feel in him
And of how you yearn to go along

But he must go alone my son
Just as you and I before
We fought our battles the best we could
But now this is to be his war

Your experiences were not mine
Nor mine the same as yours
And I know how easy it is to transpose
Your son into our duty tours

His future has not been written
So do not torture your troubled mind
By placing him in your own nightmares
For your son’s fate is yet to be defined

So be in peace my son
Have faith in yours, as I
Count off the days as I have done
But for now I must say goodbye

Wait, I cried
Can’t you stay a while
You’ve been gone from me so long
But he looked at me with that big smile

No Honey, I must go
But I am never far away
If in your heart I stay
Every night and every day

Now smile for me as I part
Try not to be so grim
Scottie’s fine, I know
For I am watching over him



Michael Tank
01/09/06



"Copyright 2006. Michael E. Tank All rights reserved. No part of this document may be copied, faxed, electronically transmitted, or in any other manner duplicated without express written permission of the author."



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