War still stabbed his muscles
into an open bleed
as he vaulted to a father of five
to children who only felt his horror
from the slap of his tongue
giving life to the memory
over boots stomping on blood
soaked into Belgian soil
sixty years before a plaque
went up in his honor
yet the metal reads Charles K.
when his birth certificate
reads Charles F.
who as a grandfather
sits in his leather chair’s grip.
Originally published in The Boy Born with a Pinhole Heart (2022)