‘Jig of the Week No. 21’

Under optimum conditions—the room quiet 
In fireglow, rain lashing on nocturnal glass— 
I start an old American puzzle. 
It smells like my Webster's Dictionary; 
It reminds me of the lesson in Latin 
Translating Lincoln's Gettysburg Address 
Into my Ciceronian of errors. 
On junior versions of wet, wintry nights 
Around Christmas, I tried to be patient, 
A jigsaw on a white enamel tray 
Encouraging pictorial wanderlust— 
My father's ear close to the wireless set's 
Hummed murmuring of Cold War '49, 
Important news and spoken politics, 
My mother sewing, my brother fast asleep. 
Posed by the artist in a daze of stunned 
Courage, a wounded man waves in the paint, 
A salutation from a grassy foreground. 
Here is a piece of sky; this one's a hoof. 
I give a man his legs, then rummage for 
A clue of horse, a clump of grass. Slaughter's 
Perfectionists, the North Virginian troops
March through the woods of Pennsylvania 
Intent on orders and aesthetic war. 
Omniscient history makes good puzzles: 
This one is Pickett's Charge at Gettysburg. 
Jigsaw research— Whose side was Pickett on? 
I look him up, then file a book away. 
The man who painted this supported Blue; 
My mind and fingers soldier with the Gray. 
Three hundred fragments of American 
Cardboard carnage! This old Bostonian box 
Crossed the Atlantic sixty years ago; 
Thousands went all over the United States 
Shipped by the Universal Distributing Company. 
A segment finishes the Stars and Stripes
Carried before blue-trousered infantry. 
A dozen pieces, more or less the same, 
Assemble shell bursts, foliage and sky, 
Turquoise and pink, a summer's afternoon 
On Cemetery Ridge, the Butcher's Bill 
Extortionate in fact but not in paint— 
Invoices brought at night, slipped under doors. 
A painter oiled his military bias, 
For a good price, and then his work became 
A reproduction of a reproduction 
Issued in multiples, mail-ordered 
All over childhood to the merry puzzlers. 
You can open old wounds like a box, 
That slow knitting of pictures and glory 
In Tennessee and Massachusetts. 
I hold an inch of space, the missing piece, 
The notional and beautiful republic 
Expressing what was fought for and who died, 
"The last full measure of devotion" …
—Put hats on heads, place heads on fallen men 
And resurrect the dead, the broken wheels: 
A finished puzzle ends up in a dream— 
A subterranean, consecrated picnic, 
A hand waving in the fraternal paint.