The funeral
—-
Along the crumbling sides
slithering deep in their
disturbed home the worms
turned from her cries
A virginal tongue hung
out of the gaping mouth
where a trail of garlic
tinged, spittle dribbled
along the pale cheek
above the white collar
—-
The decrepit retiree, who had only
the week before, in a moment of
clarity concerning the inevitable,
picked out his own final home;
a mahogany coloured box
with fake silver handles and
a cross in the style of a Celtic
Warrior’s sword-handle emblem,
dragged a shot from a newly lit
Major, watching the smoke trail
in blue fog circles through a ray
of freezing sunlight and yawned
—-
The busy one who never missed
a funeral, state occasion or the
seldom invited weddings
nodded a fickle head
Containing a barren brain,
Supported on a crooked body,
Turned to his non attentive neighbour
who ignored his complaints of
annoyance at the delay the
audacity would cause to the
rest of his self important daily
schedule of gossip filled meetings
—
There was a brown jackass in the glen
who regularly refused to comply
and a herd of cattle in the pasture
waiting with teats in need of emptying,
united in ignoring the amorous
advances of a rampant bull jailed
behind an unfortunate white washed wall.
On the hill above the honey valley
a goat mixed with sheep consuming
anything foolish enough to succumb
to natures desire to bring
forth a vegetative head or end
out of the craggy stone-dotted soil
In a wooden shack a chicken delivered
Her morning prize unaware of a bushy
Tailed devious desire for her flesh
All of them combined in a distinct
Lack of concern for the occurrence
—
The boy’s body never flinched
His eternal sleep unperturbed
His soul shed not a single tear
His mother’s prone body
six foot down, five foot length
ways and loads of feet around
shook with her loss of the only
One who smiled at her for no
reason other the inherent desire
to reply to her own
—
The cantankerous man
who smile was never found
who grumbled at teenagers
who snuffled at gossipers
who cursed freely at priests
and shopkeepers and everyone
in-between, with equal resolve
reached out unthinking a hand
calloused but gentle to take her
from her refuge, ignoring the
Scratches, leaving the broken nails
in his cheek to be removed in time.
She melted into him until the heart beat
steadied and the mind fogged enough
to never forget but to survive
as the patient clay filled the space
She had vacated.
—-
© francie mcgivney spain summer 2015
Words I love to write 