Normandy Beach

The day is coming when I will go to see

The beaches that hem the skirt of Normandy.

Seeking the ghosts of a time too brief,

I will walk the mountains on the Orne,

I will take from trailside a single leaf,

To teach me lessons of love lost, loss borne.

Let it be late summer, on the sunlit beach;

You will not be there, but I will seek you

In the crowd, your skin biscuit white, blue

Where the water chills it, fuzzed as a peach.

Let it be raining, light fall rain, when I drift

On the hills south of Caen, mouthing my leaf.

A dream of your hair, millet flaxen, gift

Memory gleans, trees' yellow, pillows my grief.

–February 20, 1998