Battle Fatigues
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By Michelle Angelini
Other Poems by Michelle Angelini
Battle Fatigues 2/17/08 As I enter Union Station, he, is wearing battle fatigues, while he stands in the MetroLink line to get his ticket. This soldier hoists a full backpack. Two suitcases sit on the floor beside him. Do these carry precious memories of his loved ones while he is on the other side of the world? I approach him, asking if he is coming home or being deployed. He replies, “I’m being deployed again.” I want to cry for this soldier, since no one is there to see him off. Thanking him for the battle he would fight, wishing him a safe tour of duty and return home. I ask, “Can I give you a hug?” After the hug, I leave to catch my train on the subway platform, I wish I’d asked him more information. Does he have a family? How long is his tour of duty? Does he want me to write him letters, so he will hear his name at mail call? How long has he been in the service? Questions that to me have no significance in my safe life, yet in his tour of danger, might mean one more person cares about what he is facing at the end of this journey. Both of us fight battles: mine to survive daily problems; his, returning to a war he didn’t start— one that he might not believe in, although he serves his country. Two strangers meet, briefly, in a train station— a nameless encounter that stays in my mind. I speculate as I move through my busy, tiring day, how long the meeting would stay in this soldier’s mind and how much it might mean to him. |
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Submitted: Monday, February 18, 2008
Last Updated: Monday, February 18, 2008
About the Poet
Michelle Angelini, aka Chelle, has been writing poetry for over 40 years. She has been published in many Southern California chapbooks and calendars. I am retired and dealing with my health issues. My Saviour, Jesus is always with me. God holds me within His wings.
I am working slowly on a second book poetry and possibly my photography. And, I'm over 65 now and still loving it, even though my social life is not what it once was because of the painful fibromyalgia. It's quite frustrating, but I know Jesus still has "work" for me to do to show how much He blesses me.
Other Poems by Michelle Angelini
- A New Day, A New Year
- A Tree in Season
- A Very Special Baby
- Amaryllis Unfurling
- An Echoed Voice (for the 10 yr WC C
- An Old Brown Leather Couch
- Ant
- Battle Fatigues
- Beneath Purple Pines
- Blood to Ashes
- But Lord
- Calcium Phosphate Crystal
- Childhood
- Debt
- Fertile Soil
- First Clematis
- Five Fall Haiku
- Full Moon Greeting
- God's Carpet
- In His Arms: Between Two Worlds
- Into Unseen Paths
- More for People at Food4Less
- Never Enough
- No Fancy Words
- Of Green Plants and Dryer Quarters
- Pruning the Branch
- Purpose in Silence
- Questions
- Radical Love
- Sasha
- Seeing with the Soul
- Sleek September
- The Call
- This Cross
- This Cross, This Sinner
- This Star
- This Waiting Soul
- Upon this Cross
- Who I Tell
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