Thomas Locicero’s most recent poem to appear here was “Border Limerick” (January 2019).

A Soldier Returns
By Thomas Locicero

You need not have a trained eye to detect
that his scars were not the prized tattoos of
a man who lives off his hands, who works with
handsaws, who blames the fleam for calloused skin
being balled up like snot in the gullet,
who made gruesome fretwork of his fingers,
whose carelessness is measured by the kerf.
You need not know the man to know that no
man his age would choose to use sunglasses
indoors, while watching the daily death counts
at dinnertime or reading Robert Frost.
You need not be on a first name basis
to recognize that cold long distance stare,
the kind poets have when they imagine
what men like these have seen so far away.
When a house pet has been gone for too long
and is presumed devoured by some pack
and then returns, its matted coat hiding
protruding ribs, half an ear missing, eyes
glazed by the sights only runaways see,
do we not become the father of the
prodigal son, racing forth to meet him
on the road with offerings of kisses,
robes and rings and sandals, a call to kill
the fatted calf, to feast and celebrate?
You need not know the man, only that he
has returned home and is now on our watch.