Soot gets on your pillow.
Blood gets on your boots.
Bells clang and wake you from your sleep,
no cup of fragrant coffee before you start your day.
It’s hard to be a fireman.
Hoses are so heavy.
Helmets can be, too.
Others leap from the burning buildings
where you have to go.
And when you dream,
you dream of doleful victims
in brightly colored muumuus
having heart attacks
and spasmed backs.
Stuck inside their too-big selves
they rely on you to carry them down
the cat-stained stairwell.
Confronted with blazing eyes
and blistering mouth
you hang on to compassion.
Still see each one as she once was
dancing the boogie-woogie
with her GI beau
long ago.
It’s hard to be a fireman.
Interrupted pot roast dinners
and interrupted showers
to rescue imprudent youth
from overturned decisions.
Or hope to.
It’s hard to be a fireman
Soot gets on your pillow.
Blood gets on your boots.
3/19/08, revised 3/30/08, revised 4/2/08, rev 4/9/08, rev 6/20/08
i will send this poem to a woman i know who is now disabled with fibro but who used to be (and still talks a lot about) being a fireman. she will deeply appreciate this. xoxoxo
ReplyDeleteExcellent.....I felt the harsh reality, but the real deal hero....thank you.
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