Happy was my time of youth

when running through new

cut fields and playing out

all afternoon, taking long

walks in tall green woods,

sailing crude wooden boats

down rushing brooks,

laughing and shouting,

sleeping on straw,

the starry night with

new crisp snow, dancing

around the Christmas tree

are now some of my more

cherished memories.
 
 

Then came the time

I had to leave, with

echoes of goose-step

boots on cobbled streets,

a lone ship on a stormy sea

eventually The Statue of Liberty,

a new beginning life for me.
 
 

Was it really long ago

when in our nuptial bed

on a mountain honeymoon

our marriage we consumed,

over the river the city skyline

from the twelfth story overlooked;

white sandy beaches

of an island our son called his home,

the volcanic pumice rock

so hot to the touch,

the huge waves, a surfer's dream,

lush tropical beauty, the deep blue sea

all that buried in my memory.
 
 
 

Then, after she was gone,

a brand new face,

a land far away, a distant place.

The Land of the Morning Calm

with sea so still it looked like glass,

many new ways I had to learn

if I was my new wife's love to earn

for through their history of

four thousand years, divergent

are their customs and their thoughts,

often serene as mountain temple grounds

yet also through huge modern cities

quite contemporarily fraught.
 
 

More recently, twice holding hands

in the hospital's maternity ward,

growing children, a nice reward.

But oh yes, I almost forgot

my dear grandmother's best dish

that she cheerfully prepared for me,

golden brown breaded veal cutlets

with pan broiled potatoes just right

to the taste, followed by what must

surely have been the most delicious

apple pie anyone has ever made.

Memories, reminiscences just fleeting by

as whisks of cumulous white clouds

in a great blue sky.
 
 

HERBERT  HOLZBAUER

© April 1997