I walk forward on the pavement

On each side, tall white columns pock the fields

Of concrete grass and granite flowers

All sun-bleached and moss overgrown

Unemotional angels guard them

The wind passes them by without motion

They are unchanged by time

Winter doesnt even claim their life!

All because they do not live

Slowly time wears on them

Wiping away the names on each blade

And shaping the granite flowers into dull figures

Yet what they are remains eternal

With each step I pass by hundreds more

And their meaning calls to me

And I weep for each soul no longer there

Little lambs they are, each who chose

To follow a god who could make them immortal

In these fields of grass and stone

And angels, whose god shall ever shepherd them

All of them Angels

They wore little white business shirts, over short white dress skirts

And each had their own wingsthough none could see,

And they paraded from one curtain to the next,

Spreading what cheer and health they could

Each nurse had her own little smile

A tiny white cap, and simple house shoes

Little white sox completed the suit

And each soldier knew the sound of their feet

And the smell of their perfumes as they passed by

The beds where each wounded man lay

Wrapped in white bandages, held together with stitches

Covered with gauze and burn ointments

They sat by each dying mans bed

Blessed each one for his journey to heaven

And showed him the way to find the gold gate

As if they were all of them angels.