War in Snow
…and snow, too, was whiter and
more plentiful in the old days,
the whole world was disguised
in bleached hospital gowns
to make the terrain seem arctic
and confusing from above,
from the huge planes looking
for the house where I lived
to drop a deliriously explosive
xmas present
but why did it take so many planes,
so many bombs to look for me?
but let’s not forget the snow
of the good old days when snow was snow,
and it came down in huge flakes,
bigger than big butterflies hurrying home,
and happy to lie down together
like us in the basement, yes,
but let’s not forget the snow,
the chronic snow cover
vintage winter 1944-45,
all that snow and yet we didn’t get
to see the butterflies coming down
that winter because the windows
of the basement were too small
and blocked with heavy beams
from the ruins next door and
the only time we went out was
between battles and to collect snow
to melt for water on fire fueled by
broken rafters, beams and studs
from the ruins next door
there was no shortage of ruins
free for the taking
Paul Sohar earned a BA in philosophy and worked a day job in chemistry while writing in every genre, publishing fifteen volumes of translations from Hungarian, most significantly poetry by George Faludy (Silver Pirouettes; Ragged Sky Press) and Sándor Kányádi (In Contemporary Tense; Iniquity Press). His own poetry collections include Homing Poems (Iniquity) and The Wayward Orchard, a 2011 Wordrunner Press Prize winner. Prose works include True Tales of a Fictitious Spy (Synergebooks) and a collection of three one-act plays from One Act Depot. Magazine publications include Agni, Gargoyle, Rattle, and Rhino, among others.
