the graveyards of Verdun
are full
with summer flowers

children are playing
hide and seek
among the crosses

their parents
   coke in hand
keep looking for the names
of their grand fathers
on the wooden beams

verifying the family album

swallows dive steeply
under darkening clouds
slowly approaching from the west

you try your best
to give them shapes
and faces

them
who in grey noisy nights
fell out of life
   bright red leaves
   flushed prematurely
   by sudden frost

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