TWO POEMS FROM DUANE HERMANN

I received a comment to my last call for the Great Genealogy Poetry Challenge last week from poet Duane Hermann. He sent me "Two poems about my ancestral village in Bavaria, published in 2005 in Prairies of Possibilities, a collection of poems of mine".

I enjoyed reading them very much.

HOME TO BAYERN

My grandfather
never missed
the hills of Franken,
He never walked the streets
of Reckendorf,
his family “hometown,”
He would have been amazed
to see the things
his father took for granted.
He did not learn,
“Gross Gott,”
as the proper greeting,
Nor did he plow
the family fields
of Bayern.
He lived
a continent away
and never knew his family.
A grandson went,
a century after,
to find the home and people;
His heart leapt
and wept for joy
in reunion.
Deutscher und Amerikaner:
alles ein Famalia –
It’s been so long…


IN FRANKEN

The little shrine by the way
with a history no one knows –
“It’s been there forever,”
like the mountains.
The land is dotted
with these little shrines,
Markers of devotion
and symbols of their faith.
They add a richness to the land,
a reminder to us now:
This land you see
is more than dirt and trees,
It embraces the souls
past more than we will know;
people lived and died and prayed
as some day you will too:
Continue on your day –
beyond this mortal life.