2

Things unknown have a secret influence on the soul. He'd been on the street for years, the vet. Big Island, six kids, all through college, full Hawaiian. A medic, he'd seen too much death. Vietnam didn't take him, but Afghanistan his daughter. Major at 22, lawyer for men accused of rape, blown apart by an IED. Brought home in a box. His hands measure it for me. Small. He tried to jump in the hole with it. What matter google cannot trace her. That the photos fail, the home towns, the age, the rank. Why I want the accuracy of fact, not dream-work. There are invisible ways of conveyance. What we do in saying is more than what words allow us.

--Kalaeloa, 19 December 2014