The less we talk about trans-generational haunting, the more difficult it is to sleep with you

In your dreams,
you become your great-great granddad
and besmirch the colonel
for waxing his mustache like a frenchman
and for playing his victrola
while you do the trench work.

Some nights, you re-enact
his belly crawl across the Somme fields,
calling out for more rum.
Your tongue twisting the words
to a faint 1916 moan.

Isadora Gruye is a writer and photographer living in St. Paul, Minnesota. She believes in cartographers and beekeepers but has little need for maps or honey. She is founder and co-editor of Nice Cage, and her poems can be found in various publications online and in the tactile world.