StonesA green field adorned carefullywith aged and ancient jewelry-- White stones heading mounds composed of softer, sweeter grass. Marble faces silently are telling stories faithfully: Numbers, letters carved in stone Below reliefs of brass. Memories they would pass. I hear the words that they recite In echoes, as if black and white. They speak to me with deaf ears, as they won't hear my response. I'm moved to tears when they invite me to imagine all that might have happened when their earthly bodies Held their lives ensconced. Now stones speak nonchalance. Eight sole years and then three score, from ‘eighty-six to ‘fifty-four: The fading chiseled numbers speak a man of sixty-eight, But next to them, the story’s more: a wife who passed in ‘seventy-four. Between their rests, these lovers Had a twenty-year long wait, Now joined beneath the slate. Another, titled "Edwin Jones" Had flowers carved into his stone And roses as if gold had once Adorned his resting place. Now his grave is left alone With no one left to visit bones of an old man whose friends have all been buried by his space, With memories erased. I wonder if their resting places really mirror how their faces Impacted the world around that to us they convey Men and women's daily races, Fights, repentance, and embraces; Now passed on, but what they've done Defines our lives today. They teach, then fade away. |