My Father called me into his den. He had a yellow envelope sitting on his desk. It was old and looked like it had a book in it - it was so full. He looked at me and placed his hand on the envelope. "Son," He said, "I'm going to tell you a story."

I waited. He seemed to be thinking. It was like he had suppressed a memory that he did not want to remember.

"I have been putting this off for a long time." He said. "This packet," he said pausing as if he was trying to remember. "It holds something I have been holding onto for over fifty years. I will need to tell you the story and then you will understand what is in the packet."

Fifty years ago and a lifetime that sometimes seems to be someone else's memories, I met a marine on the ship going to Bougainville. He wasn't like anyone I had met before. Like everyone else he did not want to fight, but he had made an arrangement with the Marines. He was a conscientious objector. He apparently wasn't against the war. He said that he couldn't fight on religious grounds.

His name was Jonas Sanderson. He had said that he was raised by his mother on an island by Seattle Washington. His Father lived in Washington DC. Jonas only saw his Father 4 or 5 in his lifetime. The last time he saw him was right before he enlisted.

Jonas was in College. He was taking English at Harvard It seems he was a real smart guy. Living on that Island he didn't go to school. His Mother taught him all he needed to go to college. Apparently it was enough, since he got into Harvard.

He was on the Winter break in his sophomore year. He took the train from Massachusetts to Washington DC. His Father was a 3 star general in the Marines. He worked at the Pentagon. It was only a few weeks after Pearl Harbor.

I don't know what took place when he talked with his Father, but it wasn't good. When he got on the train up North he decided the only thing he could do was to join the Marines. He said that he would try to tell them that he wanted to serve - that he loved his country, but he couldn't fight. It went against his religion to kill. He didn't belong to a church. His Mother had taught him everything about the Bible. He also told the recruiter that he didn't want a job stateside - he wanted to go into combat.

Those were shaky grounds to get out of fighting. Jonas never said how he got the deal he got, maybe his Father got involved.

Jonas went to boot camp just like everyone else. With his College he could have become an officer, but he didn't want that. He wanted to be a medic, and he wanted to be a Marine. I guess it was because of the old man, but somehow that didn't make sense. It must have had something to do with his last conversation with the General.

Somehow Jonas's parents never divorced. According to Jonas they loved each other. They seemed to have two different lives. The Mother was an artist. She painted, did sculpture and pottery. She was also a musician. It seemed there was nothing she didn't do or know. If I had not met her myself I would have thought Jonas had built his Mother up higher than she was. Of course that meeting comes a little later in the story.

Jonas lived with his Mother in a house on the beach on an island near Seattle. It was a short boat ride away from Seattle. The house was three stories high with an attic. It was a small house if you looked at the footprint of the house, and it was on a small lot. Of course his backyard was the water.

Jonas had his bedroom in the attic. It had a porch that looked out over the water. He said that he used to sit on the porch and listen to jazz and the blues. His Mother had a large collection of music. He also had classical records he could listen to. He sometimes got a little lonely. There weren't very many other children on the island, but somehow because he was so smart or because of how his Mother raised him he didn't seem to get along with the other children.

It was not like Jonas never saw anyone. His Mother seemed to have an endless flow of guests at the house. They were all artists, musicians, poets and even a few communists. His Mother wasn't a communist, but I guess the communists hung out with the other crowd. His education was expanded more by this flow of guests. It seemed he had a college education growing up in this environment.

When he went to college he had a hard time. The school work was not a problem. He seemed to do well in all of his classes. One problem was that he was always arguing with his teachers. I guess that to Jonas it wasn't arguing. The problem was that to Jonas all of the teachers where wrong much of the time. It wasn't like he was taking math. He was taking English, History, Philosophy, and religion. Those were all subjects that have more than one interpretation. But I guess the teachers were set in their ways, and so was he.

He enjoyed all of the arts, but his favorite was poetry. He especially loved to write. He was always quoting poems on the ship. He quoted his own poems, Shakespeare and even poems from the Bible. I'm not usually into poetry like you, and maybe it was because it was boring on the ship, but I enjoyed listening to him. We would stand on the ship and watch the water, smoking and drinking coffee. Sometimes we would slip a little Scotch into the coffee. He would quote poems and talk about literature and poetry.

The time passed pretty much that way for much of the trip. When we got closer to the island I was too busy with my preparations and him with his, so we didn't see too much of each other. He landed on the island with the first few waves and I landed later after the beach was established. We were pretty busy for quite a while, so we didn't see each other but in passing.

When I saw him next he was changed. Of course we were all changed. Somehow he was changed in a different way than the rest of us - if that could be possible. He was sitting in a foxhole. It was a relatively dry foxhole. There was no standing water it was just muddy. I was looking for a place to rest my feet. I jumped into the foxhole and there he was.

Jonas was sitting with his knees up. He had a writing tablet and a pencil. I just watched him for a few minutes. I asked him if the foxhole was free. He nodded. It was an unnecessary question. He didn't look up right away. When he looked at me I could see his tired eyes.

He watched me for a short while. He then started talking. It seems the Major was looking for some men for field commissions. Jonas and I were both Sergeants. I had been asked twice and turned them down. It wasn't a job many wanted. The Major was really bugging him though. I guess he had two strikes against him. He had a college education and he was second generation Marine. I could see that Jonas was wearing down, we all were.

I didn't see him for a few days after that. When I did he was wearing a gun and had a bar on his collar. I had not seen him with a gun before. He had picked up a 45 and a holster. I asked him if he had fired it. He hadn't, not even in practice.

I was sitting in the Majors tent. He had bottle of Scotch. We each took a shot. He looked at me. He asked me if I was friends with the Medic Jonas. It seemed I was the only one that had gotten close to him. Jonas wasn't very sociable in most cases.

It seemed that Jonas had gone out on patrol and hadn't come back yet. I know it was foolish, but I asked it I could go out looking for him.

I took a few guys with me and walked in the direction that the patrol had gone. I had decided to stay in the area that we had already secured. I had decided not to be too foolish. We had walked a ways and saw a small canyon. I didn't want to be too adventurous. The Japanese were often stashed behind our lines.

We came on a foxhole with a half dozen badly wounded Marines. In another foxhole were some more Marines. They looked like they were resting. The wounded Marines could barely speak. As the Medic went to each one of them they all pointed further on.

I took four of my patrol with me and we carefully went on. About twenty yards in we saw a large number of Japanese soldiers. They were all dead. They were piled like wood. Almost in the center of them was a soldier. He was lying back and looking at the sky. He looked almost peaceful - resting. He wasn't. We all recognized death. We were too good at it at this point.

Jonas was lying with a small arsenal of weapons. It seems the pacifist had it in him to kill. I took no pleasure in this.

Back at the camp I was looking through his things for anything personal. I noticed a canvas bag with notebooks. I thumbed through the notebooks. There were some poems. I also noticed a letter.

Dear Katy: I am sitting in my tent. This day is like any other day. My feelings are like any other day. Some of the guys talk about getting a feeling when you are going to die. I don't believe it. I have been putting off this letter for days. I didn't want you to be too disappointed in me. The General wanted me to join the Marines - be a Man - he said. I compromised. I joined as a pacifist. I learned to be a Medic. I thought that I would somehow satisfy both of you with that decision. In reality none of us were satisfied. You had always told me that I had to take responsibility for myself. You always raised me to make my own decisions. I decided to take a field commission. I don't know what I was thinking. This island gets to you. You lose your bearings - your perspective. I have been fortunate so far. I don't mean in not getting shot. I mean in not shooting anyone. I guess that was my primary goal. My secondary goal was to keep my men alive. I have been fortunate there. I wonder if prayer does any good. It seems like God is not here. Then I am sure that he is here, and I know it more than I have ever known it. I think sometimes that keeping me from killing keeps me pure. I know I am wrong. Nobody here - at least none that I have met - wants to kill. I don't even know how the Japanese feel. They are human. They just don't seem human. I am on the verge. It is not like any of these men like killing. They have all been changed. I had such an insular life. I had no real perspective on other people. You gave me the feeling that I was special, but not in the way that I was better than others. Somehow, though I had the feeling that I was either smarter or better than others. This island, this experience, has leveled us all. We are all one. Now I understand. We all have our own uniqueness. Each good and poor quality is our own burden to bear. I feel even more compelled to help more men to survive and to make it home to their loved ones. I don't know whether I am doing that as well in the position I am in or as a medic. I guess I don't quite have the energy to know the answer. I will see you soon or in eternity. All my love your son Jonas

I felt like I was invading his privacy. His poems seemed too important to put them on a ship back home, so I put them with my things. I held on to them throughout the war. When I went home I found a safe place for them.

At the end of the war I found myself back in Washington. I thought that I would look up his mother. I picked up a jeep at the base and took the ferry to the island. His house was just like he had described it. I knocked on the door. It seemed to be forever for the door to open. Standing before me was one of the most beautiful women I had ever seen. Somehow it wasn't just her looks that made her beautiful. I guess it was how she carried her looks.

She was dressed in clothes that were not normal for the day. I am guessing she made them herself. She offered me some tea. I'm not really a tea drinker, but I thought I would try it. I'm not one to waste words. I got right down to why I was there. I told her how I had met her son on the ship on the way to Bougainville. I told her how I had found the poems and letter. I then gave them to her.

She took them and held them in her hand. She then read the letter and each of the poems. After she was done she walked out of the room. I had thought she just needed her privacy. When she came back in she had a packet. She told me that these were the rest of his poems. I told her that I had tried to read the poems, but didn't quite get them. I actually did understand them for the most part, but I did not want to read the other ones. I was ready to go.

She told me that she wanted me to have the poems. She couldn't bear having them. Every time she looked at them she was reminded of Jonas and it was too hard to bear. After much begging, mind you dignified begging, she persuaded me to take the poems.

Here they are. You are the one in the family who might know what to do with them.

I took the poems from my Father. I had put them away for quite a while without even looking at them. A few years after he passed away I picked up the packet. I had remembered the story he had told me. I decided that the poems needed the story behind them. Take them and read them. I have tried to put them in chronological order.