Closing Time
April 26 2009


There is not the sadness I expected.
Instead, there is polished granite
that attests
to long lives, well-lived.
To love
and remembrance.
And to faith,
that seems far more certain
chiselled in stone.

I come here for quiet,
green grass and shade
my secret escape
from the relentless city.

I suspect the dead
are not so happy
with this.
In their eternal rest
craving
the littered streets,
the honking impatience,
the clenched fists, waving
from grid-locked cars.
And the honky-tonk music
that leaks-out
of squat brick buildings,
where burly men stand guard.

I think I’d prefer
a cheap cardboard casket
that would dissolve on the first wet day,
my mortal remains
quickly reclaimed
by earth.
Where noise could penetrate
easily.
The sound of foot-steps
6’ up,
stopping, kneeling,
offering flowers
or prayer.
The wind,
when darkness falls
the gates are locked.

And the laughter
at closing time.
The sound of passers-by, slightly tipsy.
Of high heels
striking the sidewalk, almost tripping.
Of giddy girls
clinging to boys.


I heard an interview with a musician (I forget who), who was leading the usual itinerant life of the struggling performer: on the road, a strange new town every few nights. She said she sought out cemeteries in these unfamiliar places, that cemeteries are like an anointed oasis of unexpected peace in the middle of chaos and noise. And that she didn't think the dead minded her being there.
When I first heard this, I immediately thought it might make a poem (because I feel the same way, and can't resist visiting a cemetery, the older the better). A day later, I knew it would. So it was finally time to put pen to paper, and see where it would lead.
Among other things, I like the melancholy quality here: the dead envying the living; the living blissfully oblivious of their frail mortality. And the ambivalence: the intimation that the dead aren't utterly gone, annihilated; and that passing away still being loved and having fully lived, isn't the worst thing that could happen.