25 Years Ago - A Wall Came Tumbling Down

Today's NBC news:

Berlin Wall Anniversary: Gorbachev Says a New Cold War Could Happen

(How scary is that?)

West Berliners peer through the Berlin Wall into the Eastern sector near Checkpoint Charlie on October 3, 1966.

(Picture: NBC News)

I may bore some of you as I had posted my poem about a divided Berlin only a month ago. If this bores you, I am glad for you - because then you have never had to experience the pain, the anguish, the suffering of being separated from your loved ones by an ideology, by armed guards, by a wall.

Think about it--and be grateful to live in a democracy; for it could all change overnight, you know.

Peace: War's Abandoned Grave

From its cache’d acorn womb

the seedling sprouts through pungent moss,

soon greened by a rambunctious spring’s exuberance.

The Westwind, taking pity, laughs and heaves

and trembles off the would-be devourer of tender leaves.

The sapling climbs toward the tranquil summer sky,

shading the meadow by the river,

until the Eastwind, cold and blustery,

defeats the balmy climes

and heralds in this city’s soon-to-come hart-breaking times.

Branches at half-mast, the tree holds silent vigil

against the rapings by lust-driven Ural-hordes.

Its meadow barren, flowers vanquished under iron treads,

the oak, denuded in the smoke-veiled morn’,

breathes acrid mist from the River Spree, forlorn.

Amber tears drip from the tree’s strafed bark

as the proud city, quartered by its raucous victors,

writhes in shredded ruin, a graveyard of the living dead.

A people torn apart, despaired,

as brother now must fear the brother whom war had spared.

A saw’s rasping bite takes hold;

the last tree topples at the cusp of dawn.

The oak’s green planks strain vainly toward freedom

from deep within the cursed Wall.

A fire-blackened church accuses, a grim reminder to them all.

The pendulum of time reverses.

Survivors hail their former foe.

To these living dead, abandoning their graves of war,

as if he were a citizen, but keener,

a young world leader avows peace with:

Ich bin ein Berliner!

* * *

(Excerpt from Moments of the Heart)