Funeral: The Last Rites

The funeral passed as a fog set to Minor D.
My belly enceinte with her progeny
combined with a heart in pieces
sent my essence into auto-pilot
as the ceremony floated by.

The grand procession to the burial grounds
enlivened my dormant soul.
How she would have loved the pomp.
Motorcade police screeched an entire city to a stop
As her remains and those who mourned the whole flew swiftly by.
Inebriation caught from the very wonder and awe I’d inherited from her.

The weeping communion of family at the gravesite was a concert to behold.
How to suitably lower this divinity into the ground
as shattered, we were left standing.
So we sang. With each note, strands of her DNA mingled with the wind.
Each shovel of dirt percussion
and our harmonizing laments her very breath.

‘It….Is…..Well’.

And though my swollen body growing an extra heart and mind wouldn’t grasp it then, peace like a river flowed that day and it was, indeed, well with my soul.

R.

grace is giving someone what they need
without price tags they can't emotionally afford
love, patience, alcohol sometimes drugs

keep your judgement of what you don't understand far from me
I see the vets on the streets can't live in a tiny home village ptsd sees to that
no where safe for the broken
carrying a mountain of oppression
experimented on the mentally different

calling out to the madness they see
turn up the sun God keep them warm at night
empty castle, empty buildings and still they roam in the elements alone
carry their pain their own personal hell
so, I pick up their burden and carry it in my soul

with the last of my energy I will stand and fight
with my last breath cast doubt of the light
the light is where you get erased
fight the good fight people and realize

he is against us

the elite rise while the humble die alone
with some kind of disease like covid
drowning in their lungs
coma bound stuck in limbo
while family members are ordered to stay home

their loved ones slip away...

into the void
and I scream hold on loves I'm coming

He won't sip off our pain.

Funerals are somber affairs,
A time for tears and whispered prayers.
We gather to remember one gone,
To say goodbye and sing their song.

The pews are filled with sorrowed kin,
All dressed in black, a solemn grin.
We listen to the eulogies,
Of a life lived, its joys and leisures.

The hymns they play, they resonate,
With all the love that we create.
For the one we've lost, who'll be missed,
A void in our hearts, we can't resist.

And as we leave, flowers in hand,
We think of them, and understand.
That life goes on, though they have passed,
Their memories with us, forever fast.

They say the music stopped that day,
and in a sense that's true.
I prefer to imagine that you're still playing,
restored in body,
with the vigour of youth.
You played elaborate organ,
graceful oboe,
powerful piano,
and as professionals together,
our collaborations soared;
somehow more than their two parts.

Beyond the veil,
we can no longer play together,
and so I arranged something in your name.
The three girls and I performed it for you
but it felt like you were there
in the lines, the texture and the harmony.
It had your imprint all over it.
Were you singing along?

Should you be waiting,
taking a well-earned rest
before the great Conductor starts anew,
know this: we sense you with us now.
Even today, I hear your music;
your gift to us which never ends.
Wait there for me
to join the eternal symphony.

(This is an awful poem but it helped... With what, I don't know, it just helped).

I.

Terrible, sinuous bottles. Terrible, vibrant
colors. Such shimmering, pretty lies.
Each one signifying something that will never be.
The only beauty, the sound of your name,
which would shatter and die.

II.

My sculptured, silver throat.
Or at least, crystalline gate when flooded,
threaded shards pressed inward,
hungry, their sweet, delicate teeth.
My body under blankets, Venetian,
red and purple like a baby, fevered and heaving.

They always associated you with cold.
I wanted to make you warm but it was
breathing life into the dead. Still didn’t we always,
deep inside, want to be one with that purity,
frozen in sinlessness to nothing that will answer,
bodies grown acclimated to the most beautiful cruelties.

Inside a transparent coffin, the princess sleeps.

III.

I forgot I died once before and I discovered
there was nothing to look forward to,
the road diverged but two paths led straight back
to Hades, the pain of slow afternoon light
and a frilly womb scented by lavender and stillness.

Or rather, a stopping and a starting
with no memory in between.

On the way I had grown lost, haunted by
slippers and fairies and the faintest traces of dust.
When he pressed me to the door,
a reflection exquisite, forced me to look him
in the eyes the whole way through.

IV.

If I looked into you I would see what I know,
the blotched skin, mismatched eyes,
face of an ogress.
Her heavy body that was also my body, the dancing hernia,
the word shock repeated over and over, another lovely word,
soft staccato rolling from my tongue.

I huddle in a house deplete of the world.
She has won in the end, even after the end,
fearful tyrant, beloved foe, I yearned
for her love like dew on apples.
Now fading, losing volume. Not quite a pinprick, no.
I know the treachery of the living,
I writhe with it. Loved ones unrecognizable now.
My feet cold and numb and clear as hers.

There is no love. There is only need.
There is no safety.
There is no point. There is only pointlessness.