James Michael Alan Curry-Long

01 October 2003

“I didn’t get to say ‘Good-bye’”
     Was his mother’s forlorn cry,
Mourning the death of her son –
     A victim of a Hit and Run

He’d overslept, and was in a hurry,
    And to his class he did scurry
But on the dark and foggy street
    James and an auto did fatally meet.

He was received as a gift from Heaven
    In 1988 on April Twenty-Seven,
And back to heaven his spirit flew
    In 2003 on September Twenty-Two.

A fine young man of fifteen years
    Has left behind, shedding tears,
Mother and Father, Sisters (two),
    Brothers (three) and sweetheart, too.

Described by those who knew him best
    As kind, caring, and full of zest;
Handy with tools, ready for fun,
    Devoted to God – and a loving son.

His life was short – his demise unfair,
    But his memory lives on, his loss we must bear;
And so to his mortal remains we sigh,
    James Michael Alan Curry-Long… Good-bye.

© 2004 by Patrick Alan Long

Published in The Best Poems and Poets of 2003
ISBN 0-7951-5245-0

Lament of a Father

It was an early Monday morning,
    To seminary class he was bound.
Suddenly hit - thrown through the air -
     To lie there, with no one around.

The driver stopped, and sat awhile,
    For he knew that someone he’d hit
And then, in fear, he drove off
    To home, and call off work sick.

On the road he laid, crumpled and broken,
    In the early morning fog,
Without awareness to even cry out
    For his mother, or father… or God.

Around the bundle of clothing spotted,
    Another car approached and veered.
Worried, this driver U-turned to see
    Around what it was that he steered.

Only to witness the following car
    Strike the bundle a blow
That the bundle was a little boy,
    The unfortunate woman didn’t know.

With the poor boy, waiting for help,
    The two drivers did stay,
In tears, to keep the boy company
    Until an ambulance took him away.

The doctors and nurses did their best
    For that boy on the hospital bed
But for naught – the body too damaged -
    And the young man’s spirit had fled.

My son was buried one week later,
    The chapel packed to both ends,
It was obvious that he was well-loved
    When seen off by family and friends.

It seems a cliché, but it is a fact,
    That I regret there were things undone.
But only the Creator truly knows
    How much I love – and miss – my son.

© 2004 by Patrick A. Long

Poetry

01 October 2003