You led your tanks into enemy territory

never imagining that one day

you’d get lost in the neurons that

criss-cross in tangles that

lead nowhere.

Your thoughts transmorgify into words

that mean nothing to the people

who listen for a sign that

you’re there somewhere

in the muddled consonants.

Your fingers seek the skin of the girl

you wed more than half a century ago;

puzzled and annoyed,

you brush away the gnarled hand

that wants reassurance too.

Your eyes are wide open, almost unblinking

as if to capture even more information

to make up for that which dares

to slip away, eluding you

like your night-blooming cereus.

You come back occassionally and it’s like the times

when you came back from war;

you’ve missed so much that

it’s hard to catch you up

before you’re gone again.