The Arrowhead

I found an arrowhead,And I tied it around my neckAs a symbol of power and strength,A memory of the endless wars And a message to myself and othersThat I still remember the ancient art.Not really. It was a trinket tied with leather That I found in a gift shop.And I thought that it looked cool.I wore it to school the next dayAnd my friends thought that it was cool,So I kept on wearing it through my youth.I wore it on graduation day, And I wore it when I went away a soldiering.And that did not go so well for me.But we won the war and I came home With the arrowhead still hanging around my neck.And when I did, I found another war waiting,The war to make a life and livingAs a broken combat vet.And that didn’t go so well for me.I married once. I married twice. I married once again.And all the while, I wore the arrowhead.The leather wore out several timesAnd I replaced it.But I never threw it away. I don’t know why.I lived alone in my late forties and thereafter.I slept in abandoned cars.I slept in tents in the woods.People would have said that I was homelessBut I was not. Just unable, unwilling, I’m not sure which,To try at a losing game.And I drank a lot. That started with the warAnd continued throughout the losing battle of my life.And I was never able to connect with people very well,Wives and children, coworkers.Even my siblings, we were close when I was young,But things were different after the war.And by the time I was fifty, they didn’t recognize me.To be honest I didn’t recognize myself.But I’m not so sure I cared.I lived a long time that way before I got help.And I have never really gotten better.But with the help of a higher power, I sobered up.And when I did, I let myself remember,Not everything, that’d be too much,But the good things,Particularly the people that I loved.And even now, they stand out in my memoryWith amber light around.And I think that I am at peace with what I’ve lostAnd hopeful for the thing that I have found.And today, the winter light is bright out on the desert.I untie the arrowhead from my neckAnd hike as far as I can manage.I dig a hole and drop the old arrowhead in,Cover it up and tamp it down.And then I make my way back home.And I am not sure why I did that.It was a trinket, bought in a gift shop.And I’m not sure why I wore it for so long.But now that it’s gone, I feel strangely lighter,And the future is bright before me.And that is a strange thing For an old man like me to feel.