Deer, braced against the wind, graze among cannons
Upon the transfigured remains of the dead.

Ten thousand frogs, from craters-turned-vernal-pools
Cry out, lamenting the great dissipation.

On a snowy granite column, two figures
Gaze past each other, extending handshakes.

In glances not quite meeting, another hides,
Obscured in the blind spot of their cross-eyed stares.

His plight the reason for the rift here patched,
His name, his toil, his pension forgotten still.

He was a man, whatever past
Illusions and alliances denied him.

But the figures’ blank, whitened faces hint
That next time, they would rather work together.

Image: New York Monument, Chickamauga and Chattanooga National Military Park, January 2021.