For Cancer: I Hate You

 The hospital hall, a sterile, hollow hum,

Where time is measured by the falling crumbs

Of shared last meals, and whispers soft and low,

The words we needed but could never know.

We watched you shrink, the vibrant light you were,

As shadows grew and held you in their blur.

The fierce, bright laughter, now a fragile sigh,

A quiet echo underneath the sky.

We held your hand, a map of worn-out years,

And tried to soothe away the rising fears.

We promised stories, futures, moments bright,

To pull you from the slow and creeping night.

But some wars end with silence, not with shouts,

And love becomes a harbor in our doubts.

We close our eyes and see your youthful face,

Before the thief had stolen all your grace.

Now every memory is stained with gray,

The ache of you who had to go away.

A silent phone, a vacant chair you'd keep,

A love so deep it makes the mountains weep.

We live our lives and try to find a way

To honor you in every passing day.

But a part of us is gone, and nothing's quite the same,

Since cancer came and whispered out your name.

Arlington Sleeps

Upon the hill where silence grows,
Where marble lines in stillness close,
A thousand names the earth has kept
Here, Arlington, the brave have slept.

Beneath the oaks, beneath the stone,
Lie those who faced the fight alone,
And those in ranks, in skies, in seas,
Now cradled by eternity’s breeze.

The bugle weeps at close of day,
A final hymn where heroes lay.
Each grave a story, cut too short,
Each flag a silent last report.

No anthem swells, no crowds remain,
Just whispers in the falling rain.
Yet here, the nation bows its head
To walk among the honored dead.

Not just for glory, medals, fame
But duty carried without name.
A nurse, a son, a friend once near,
Now part of sacred silence here.

And still, the rows reach toward the blue,
A solemn march forever true.
They ask no praise, no grand display
Just memory that does not stray.

So may we tread with humbled pace
Upon this ground, this hallowed place.
For freedom blooms where sorrow lies
And peace is bought where valor dies.