Wooden Box: Part II

When Doubt Came Slowly
1964 Prologue Part 1: "Wooden Box" Part 2

Once day was done at school,

we walked in twos and threes and fours

to street corners where

“safety boys” with outstretched arms

kept us till the traffic cleared

then scurried us along.

It seemed at first

that not a thing had changed.
The sidewalks that we knew so well
still wound the same way home.

But that day more than most
mothers stood

waiting on front porches;

TVs flickered in the corner

as tables were set for supper;

and fathers coming home from work

sat a little longer in their cars,

trying to recall the things

dads are supposed to know.

In three days' time,,

we saw the widow veiled in black
with two children at her side.

We watched them say good-bye

at the cathedral steps.

From there the horse-drawn caisson

bore the wooden box

to Arlington.

We winced at the three shots

of the soldiers' seven guns.

We watched them fold the flag.

We heard the broken note of taps

and the final nine that fill the sky,

"All is well, safely rest, God is nigh"

Then in farewell,

she laid her face,
as we had on our desks,
against the smooth, cold wood.

© Copyright 2007, TK, Patterns of Ink

John-John Kennedy salutes his father's casket as

it passed toward Arlington. November 25, 1963.