They say if you go ’round
midnight, you can hear
soldiers crawling up the bluff.

Leaves crunch beneath their boots,
Confederate wagons roll
across the blank bridge
and wounded men holler

as cannons blast and iron
balls whistle through air.
Maybe you’ll think you see,

but when you look again
it’s not there. All I know
is, I’m leaning over this rail,

watching the full moon
stare back at me
in rippling water.
I feel summer night wind

and the only sounds
I hear are the long ago
shatter of widows’ hearts
and these words marching,

with soldier feet, marching
inside my head.