Enemy Encounter  

by Padraic Fiacc  (1924-    )
 (Patrick Joseph O’Connor)      

Dumping (left over from the autumn)  
Dead leaves, near a culvert  
I come on  
           a British Army Soldier  
With a rifle and a radio  
Perching hiding.  He has red hair.    

He is young enough to be my weenie  
-bopper daughter’s boy-friend  
He is like a lonely little winter robin.    

We are that close to each other.  I  
Can nearly hear his heart beating.    

I say something bland to make him grin,  
But his glass eyes look past my side-  
Whiskers down  
                                   the Shore Road street.  
I am an Irish man  
                        and he is afraid  
That I have come to kill him.