Dumping (left over from the autumn)   
Dead leaves, near a culvert   


I come on   
           

a British Army Soldier   


With a rifle and a radio   


Perching hiding.  He has red hair.    

 

He is young enough to be my weenie  

-bopper daughter’s boy-friend   


He is like a lonely little winter robin.    

 

We are that close to each other.  I  

Can nearly hear his heart beating.    

 

I say something bland to make him grin,   


But his glass eyes look past my side-   


Whiskers down   
                                  

the Shore Road street.  


I am an Irish man   
                       

 and he is afraid   


That I have come to kill him.

 

–Padraic Fiacc  (1924-    )
 (Patrick Joseph O’Connor)