A Box of Diamonds,” Rosemary Kavanagh

Rosemary Kavanagh

It was a hot spot out there

Like bombs and machine guns weaving my father’s despair.

A glorious moment I had Reaping the benefits alone, Flashlight on my radiophone Snaking the crooked And cracked cement Towards the location Of her sippy cup. The child no one wanted Brought me out in the Ebony night flickering with lightning bugs, As the cadre’s fireworks imploded Into the Awe of Aurora borealis. The manmade kind, An ancient invention of the Chinese Glittering as the microscopic terrorist, Is killing us all Who are free For want of company.

I closed my tearful eyes Tearful like a flash flood On a dry empty plain And sighed as I felt My artistic legerdemain Go into my father’s past.

World War II visits me at last! The machine guns wiping out the Jews And bullets zooming in the Parisian air. My diamond ring from a collection box In Bergen-Belsen was there! Oh, the stench of rotting flesh! The death of beauty!

Take me back to the sweet scent of summer air! In the unsettling din of the Saginaw night,

The rebellious cadre concedes, Acquiescing their fireworks to socialize Then disappear. Oh, how I wanted it to last,

Like a mint ice cream cone that melts too fast! He firebombed Dresden, Then landed his plane among the ashes To see what he had done. With 27-year-old hands on hips, Head shaking in disbelief, He saw the open jaw of a child screaming Yet no child left.

There is a magnificence in causality But only if one sees the truth That is part of the magnificence—

What he did What he saw What he smelled

Was passed on to me one night in Saginaw. This Fourth of July Decussated my family tree.