D is for Dirge
A dirge is a poem of lamentation, and is generally written to be read at a funeral. No one I know has died recently, so I’m going to go ahead and get creative.
Cold as marble
Pale as ash
This is how I think of the past.
Of course, you were alive then,
I tell myself now.
You were warm once,
When I touched your breast
I believe I felt a heart in your chest–
A dull throbbing
No urgency,
All calm,
Just with me.
I have laid that thought to rest,
A palm’s worth of dirt, the past be blessed.
I felt the pull long ago,
Quiet and septic
The silence contagious
Skin went cold.
Glances glazed.
Touch, empty,
On flesh, hollow.
This is the way that death will catch me.
I have laid that thought to rest,
A palm’s worth of dirt, the past be blessed.
In all of my memories
You now stand–
Morbid porcelain
Glass eyes open.
I thought you were alive.
All of those kisses
Upon cold lips,
Now unseemly.
You’d laugh and say,
“Well, when I kiss the mirror
We always bump noses!”
So clever. Cold. Clever.
Would I’d forget…
I have laid that thought to rest,
A palm’s worth of dirt, the past be blessed.