May 2001 Entry -- Remembering

shroud blossoms
- for Courdry

today I watched them unfold quilts
while old women wearing name tags
circulated among somber witnesses
they were godsends bearing boxes of kleenex
to those who struggled with the balance
between decorum and emotion,
those old women were sharp
and came just in time -- like cures
are supposed to -- but          the war hero general
was right when he said, "life
is not a hollywood movie"
but you lived your's like one my
boyhood friend turned careless queen --

I wasn't trying to but I remembered
my mother's voice over the phone when
she told me you were sick, her denial words
"I hope he gets better"          cracking with grief
as I silently listened, because I'd already heard and
I just couldn't tell her you wouldn't get better
with dread certain          impunity
your failing kidneys ridiculing all hope,
miracles being about as likely as god
admitting it was all just a big joke

-- so they opened these oversized cards and love letters
and I watched flowers bloom anyway out of grave-
sized cloth         plots of grief, opening like buds
petal by petal, and filling the room
with a scent like remembering.

Copyright 2001, Rune