Desert Camouflage

Grandpa was good at persuading the others

after the official evacuation orders.

Detained at Tulare Assembly Center,

he was the voice of reason among his angry friends,

raising everyone’s spirits

when he started the morning exercise class.

Some issei said Grandpa couldn’t be trusted --

after all, hadn’t he volunteered

to fight in World War I?

And why did he speak better English

or brag that he was already a U.S. citizen

when the government denounced them as aliens?

At Gila, when nobody was willing

to make camouflage netting the military needed,

only Grandpa could talk them into it.

How many American soldiers would ever suspect

the netting protecting them was sewn by issei

whose faces could never be camouflaged?