Funeral Poem #5

This article was published on 06.30.11

Memory has made the past too heavy;
It has seemed unbearable.
We tried to live in the air,
To drift above in tenderness;
But air will not hold joy upright.
It dries out, a bitter crust
Left on the table; it hardens, it cracks—
How hard!—even the carnation’s petals
Have dried, fractured like bones.
We feel the earth, rough,
All along our bodies’ lengths.