New Poem

Something I wrote today after walking through the cemetery with my kids:

Yea Though We Walk

We take our daily walks

through Queen of Heaven

and I find myself inured—

forgetting or not minding the decay

six feet beneath my own.

The horror that would rouse

Any other place

Is here removed, germane—

Put to sleep beneath silk flowers.

As days go by my excuses thin

For why he cannot play in the lush grass

(as if he could disturb the dead!

If any part of them is there,

I think his shouts of joy

Would be a welcome noise.)

I mull the ways I could explain

This place to three years’ ears—

“a park for dead people”

clunks around in my brain—

is that the best I’ve got?

And so for now we walk.

I point out the statue of Jesus’ Mommy

In her blue coat

And we try to catch some mist

From where the sprinklers bless

The vacant earth.

Someday that space will all be filled,

But that day is not yet.