Terrible things are happening
somewhere else. All the more reason
to attend to this ritual undressing, 
this summer baptism, here
in the century-old locker room
of Cleveland Municipal Pool,
where I pull on my swimsuit at dawn.

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It is a musty and cavernous room,
full of the ghosts of boys who swam
through hot Midwestern afternoons, before
Verdun, and Passchendaele, and the Somme, 
and danced with flappers in silver dresses, 
and wore their raccoon coats in open cars, 
before Anzio, Midway, and Iwo Jima,

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and smoked their Luckies at Cleveland Stadium
and swigged cold Schlitz with their pals, before
Pusan and Inchon, Khe San and Tet,
and some guy landing on the moon, 
can you feature it, the young boys

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walking with their girls at midnight
on Euclid Beach, before Tikrit
and Desert Storm and Fallujah,
starting families of their own,
before Kabul, Shewan, and Kandahar.

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A handful of us dawn-risers, 
pale and sixtyish, grinning like kids, 
slip on our suits and head out
to our cold blue laps, hearing it
echo from the ancient rafters
and rusty lockers: the laughter
of the boys who never came back.