He didn’t have a walrus mustache

Nor a heavy rifle-musket, and

His uniform was quite different.

No. He had a whacking big

Remington revolver stuck in

His belt, and a long sabre

Hanging at his side when he rode

with the 2nd Maine cavalry

North and east from Louisiana

Through Alabama to meet Sherman

And the end of it.

Otherwise

I like to think this stern

Stone man standing on the

High ground behind the library

Looking down the Dexter valley

Is my great-grandfather, and

As I salute him on occasion

I sometimes wonder if, when

He held me as a baby,

He wondered what terrible

Future wars I might face.

Henry D.M. Sherrerd Jr. has been an outboard-motor mechanic, mapmaker, bartender, military data analyst, technical writer and screenwriter, among still other occupations. He attended Bowdoin College and later the University of Maine where he won awards for his poetry in the 1970s. He lives in Dexter.

Uni-Verse offers a poem grown from the experience of Maine twice a month in Monday’s Discovering section. Poems of fewer than 20 lines on a Maine-related theme may be submitted for consideration to poetry@bangordailynews.net or mailed to Dana Wilde, Uni-Verse editor, Bangor Daily News, P.O. Box 1329, Bangor 04401.