Remembering the dead

my mind heavy with arithmetic ~ D. Bonta

On this holiday, the living
visit the cities of the dead,
there where all they’d ever
loved or hated have gone to sleep
in rows, their headstones covered
with moss, the letters carved
into them blurred and softened.
Here is the grave of the man
laid to rest in a seersucker suit,
here the American that time all but
forgot in this part of the world.
Here is the woman who whitened her face
to rival the moon’s, and here the neighbor
who played cards nightly with his father.
And in the pools the frogs continue
to lay their eggs, dark speckled beads
soon kicking in the water; overhead, funnel
clouds of mosquitoes; and the dry sift
of branches with their rain of needles.

 

In response to Via Negativa: Matched.

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