A Trauma.... Poem by RIC BASTASA

between galas
and olingan is an old
bridge
built by the koreans

stories were told
and retold that on those
nights
a funeral march passes
the mourners wearing black
and silent

i was then six years old
and with friends that sunday
afternoon
we took a raft and explored
the river
beneath the old bridge built
by the koreans

shocked to see a woman
dead, thrown by unknown culprits
tied with a wire on her neck
cold and nameless.