For the most part
they carried themselves with poise,
a kind of dignity.
you can see it in the way they walk
it can be heard when they talk.
Brave as brave can be,
but courage wavers in time of need
Now and then,
however, there were times of panic,
when they squealed or wanted to squeal but couldn't.
They would force themselves to stand.
As if in slow motion,
frame by frame,
the world would take on the old logic-absolute silence,
then the wind, then sunlight, then voices.
It was the burden of being alive.
But courage reappears in the silence
they would squint into the dense, oppressive sunlight.
For a few moments, perhaps, they would fall silent,
lighting a joint and tracking its passage from man to man,
inhaling, holding in the humiliation.
Scary stuff, one of them might say.
But then someone else would grin or flick his eyebrows and say,
Roger-dodger, almost cut me a new asshole, almost.