30 years ago in Belfast

Dear British Soldier
How old was I, 19, 20?
How old were you? The same?
Your rifle was leveled at my chest...
I remember your stance, your form,
do I remember your face?
Or, am I filling in over the years...?
I well remember my fear,
the feeling that my legs evaporated...
the feeling of knowing how a small hole in my chest
would be nothing to the large hole in my back...
I remember being to frightened to do my job, to photograph you...
But, if you had but tightened your finger on the trigger...
and the lead traveled through me faster than sound...
faster than pain...
faster... as fast as shock...
would I have felt the fear drain away and be replaced by...
the sublime moment of fulfillment of all I meant?
Would I have known that all I expected I had lost...
was nothing... was waste of life... of pain of solitude?
To die young for a meaning rather than live longer than ?
Use? Love? Need?
Oh, dear soldier... I remember the opening at the end of your rifle...
I remember the cold wet air...
I remember and wonder why... if... and why not.