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The Legal Studies Forum
Volume 30, Number 1/2 (2006) reprinted by permission Legal Studies Forum Lawyers & Poets Scenes | | Dreams MEL BELIN _________________ Twins One small corner stone, a lamb carved in at the top, the names beneath, Anne and Clinton Brice, the word twins and 1938-1939, from a period Steinbeck published Grapes of Wrath, looking back at the Depression, and with its perfected shapes of pure white Trylon and Perisphere, that futuristic New York World's Fair. Inside the rusted fence, I can hear, almost . . . beyond the chatter of sparrows, Gehrig, stricken with ALS, talk of a "bad break," but still affirm, as if ready to climb Glenn Miller's "Stairway to the Stars," he's "the luckiest man" on earth. Sparse markers of an era! Like the crosses and granite here, few names, in part, a tiny pauper's field? - behind a strip mall, off Little River Turnpike - with grass, weeds, tulips, fallen trees. I gaze at the memorial stone, weather-worn, for the two lives lost. Maybe scarlet fever carried one off, then the other in a time, forever Gone With The Wind, The Wizard Of Oz, Wurthering Heights, Goodbye Mr. Chips, Ninotchka . . . when Nazi tanks tore through Poland. And what of the parents? For an instant, I become them, loving, broken . . . Can I ever dare have children again? Close my eyes . . . Another century's rush hour traffic, oblivious, accelerates past. [723]
Mel Belin was born in Hazleton, Pennsylvania. Now retired, he resides in Arlington, Virginia. Belin obtained his B.A. from Dartmouth College and his J.D. degree from George Washington University. He served as an attorney in the General Counsel's Office, Department of Housing and Urban Development. His poetry has been published in various journals, including Midstream, Cumberland Review, Poet Lore, Connecticut River Review, Phoebe, and The Cape Rock. His first book of poetry, Flesh That Was Chrysalis, was published by Word Works, Inc., in 1999. "Twins" was first published in the Potomac Review. |
