Three Poems From Childhood

Dear George,

I’ve been busy this autumn quarter with my OLLI writing courses, “Poetry Writing Workshop” and “Advanced Poetry Writing”.  This helps to keep blood flowing in my brain.  Childhood experiences are one topic I regularly draw upon.  Here are a few that stood out to me.

Love,

Dave

A Boy’s Dream  

Every Sunday my Grandpa Guy

gave me a new tin soldier

Heroes of heroes, strong and brave

with their rifles, bazookas, Tommy guns, swords

Only five, I soon commanded a mighty army

a force capable of defeating the Nazis

We fought fierce battles for hours on end 

Then one day my parents

took me to a restaurant 

where the owners had on display

an incredible machine

enclosed in a glass case 

Hundreds of inter-connected parts

moving together up and down

back and forth 

whirling about in circles

I watched as if hypnotized 

and daydreamed about it for weeks afterward 

If only I could find the right metal pieces

I could surely build a machine like that

Everywhere I went 

I watched for scraps of metal 

Then the idea came to me 

My tin soldiers

All those heads, arms, legs

So many little metal pieces

I could break them off

fit them together

and use them to build my machine

The hardest decision I’d ever faced

I did love my tin soldiers

But I loved that machine more than anything 

Alone by myself in Grandpa’s living room

I threw the tin soldiers as hard as I could

against the flowered wallpaper

but they were too solid to break

So I got Grandpa’s hammer

and smashed every one of them into pieces 

I spread the parts out on the rug

and began putting them together

These two, no those two

maybe these other ones 

A sudden uneasiness

Then panic  

Then total devastation

None of the pieces fit together 

Not a single pair

My world came crashing down

What was I thinking? 

What had I done?  

The pile of broken limbs and torsos lay before me

I tried putting the soldiers back together

but that didn’t work either 

I cried for hours

Fifty years later I told my dad

about my idea of building a machine 

He was incredulous

“We thought you hated your grandfather”

No, that’s not right

I loved my grandfather

I just had a wrong idea

* * *

Stuff We Learned As Boys 

I did my childhood in the 1940s

World War Two and its aftermath 

My dad left our family for the Navy 

But I still learned a lot about being a man

The major lesson

Men either kill or get killed 

We observed this, of course, in the Movietone News 

Ships sinking, planes on fire, corpses in a trench 

But also at the Saturday matinee

Swordsmen, gangsters, pirates 

G-men, Apaches, pygmies with poison darts   

We children spent our leisure hours playing military games 

Or cops and robbers, cowboys and Indians

I owned a six-shooter, a luger, a .45, a rifle with a bayonet

A hunting knife, a jackknife, a Bowie knife, a machete

Loads of cap pistols, water pistols, a machine gun that shot ping pong balls 

Not to mention my bow and arrows

When we weren’t busy shooting at each other

We played contact sports

Basketball, football, boxing, wrestling

Determining who could triumph over whom

Who were winners, who were losers

Men, we concluded, don’t show emotion

Tough guys dish out pain and can take it

Being weak is the worst sin of all

Looking back, this was not ideal preparation 

for marriage, family, parenthood, friendship

Perhaps it was useful for pro football or the army

* * *

The Time That God Nearly Passed the Test

My family wasn’t very churchy

so I depended on my childhood chums

for my religious upbringing

Mostly Catholic 

they taught me about the saints

the ten commandments

errant priests and altar boys

rituals of the Mass 

and, of course, Heaven and Hell

I wound up confused

in doubt of God’s existence

even though my chums told me 

I was wacko 

and in danger of burning for all eternity.

One day

I decided to settle the matter

once and for all 

I shuffled a deck of Bicycle playing cards

closed my eyes

and said aloud

“God, if you exist

prove it to me by 

letting me draw

the six of clubs.”  

I held my breath

pulled a card at random from the deck 

turned it over slowly

and stared at……..

The Six of Clubs!

Probably the heavens thundered

blazing lights, the sound of trumpets.

I broke into a sweat.

Disoriented

barely able to breathe. 

After an hour of stupefaction

I picked up the deck of cards again. 

“God,” I said, “I have to give

you one more test.

Just to be sure. 

If you let me draw the nine of hearts

I will absolutely believe in you forever.   

I promise.”

Then I drew the card

held my breath

turned it over anxiously

and…..it was not the nine of hearts.  

“That’s it,” I said to myself.  

“Nobody there.” 

But later I reconsidered. 

Perhaps He was insulted

and felt it beneath Him 

to continue going along with a 

thirteen-year-old boy’s reckless whims.  

“I proved Myself to you 

when you asked Me

and you chose not to believe 

the word of God.

So be it.”  

From time to time 

I still wonder about that.  

Whatever the case, it was certainly 

a peak religious moment

and it did make me think about miracles.