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Poems

Status Among The Dead

In a cemetery,

Sons fallen slap the backsides of tombstones

As a violent caress of frosted breath blows beneath them.

In some parts, rock stands in long obelisk shapes casting shades atop remains

Obscuring the memorials but not the memories of those who rest there.

In other parts, where grass has grown

Lay dust on mire, ash in lye.

No cure is known

For the cause is “why?”

Where bones rest

Not one can speak

No sins confessed

From a stoney creek

Here lie the best with tombstoned heads

There lay the meek in solemn beds

Here stones stand tall and steal the light

There bone sands fall to no respite.

In a cemetery,

Father’s fallen fill the field

In rows of plots their bodies yield

Torn and tattered, shattered shields.

Night descends making fair

The dark aspersion of a nameless dread

The hope is now in a lonely prayer

To raise our status among the dead.

What air?