We were best friends
He gave me brass medals

pulled from the coats
in his mother’s closet

He taught me to roll a smoke
like a stoic private

We huddled in the side yard
by the chrysanthemums; cupped

our hands, held a flame
out of the wind

just under the chimney
cleanout…

Summer nights, we torched
little army men

& whirled them about, scorching
each other’s wrists & arms

& thighs… We laughed madly
in pretend tents,

lighters illuminating nylon
sleeping bags––

Chris had blond hair & blue eyes
Nimble on the tennis court

Chris was well versed in the strategies of chess
& Vietcong tactics…

Chris had an affinity for Hitler; I didn’t
understand this…

Chris, whose father never came
home

Scot Siegel is an award-winning urban planner and poet from Lake Oswego, Oregon, where he lives with his wife and two daughters and serves on the board of the Friends of William Stafford. He is the author of two volumes of poetry, Some Weather (Plain View Press 2008) and the chapbook Untitled Country (Pudding House Publications 2009). Siegel has received awards and commendations from Aesthetica Magazine (UK), Nimrod International (Pablo Neruda Poetry Prize, semi-finalist) and the Oregon State Poetry Association (OSPA). In celebration of Oregon's Sesquicentennial, Poetry Northwest and the Oregon State Library selected Some Weather as one of 150 Outstanding Oregon Poetry Books, one for each year of statehood. Siegel’s poem "Autumn Turns Through Stratified Wars" is nominated for a Pushcart Prize (New Verse News) in 2009. His poems are anthologized in Verseweavers (Oregon State Poetry Association) and Oregon Stories, forthcoming from Ooligan Press (Portland State University). Siegel is editor of the online poetry journal Untitled Country Review.