Keep watching those funerals —how they launch black sedansover cemetery landscapes,stop them by a new gravewhere the body enters orbitaround a darkness we can’t see.Keep looking at widows —how their tears eat mascara,their faces a jittery maskthat grief shakes like a tree,releasing poisonous fruiton the unrelenting earth.Keep imagining yourselfin your last sad vehicle,lowered by a steel machineinto your past, the only thingleft for you to dream about,as the future takes off without you.Keep leaving white stonesthat are chiseled with namesand dates you’ll never know,some too young, others old,all of them carrying death,the last child they had to birth.Keep staying inside your home —so guns won’t blast you,knives won’t cut your throat,fire won’t taste your skin,heart will continue beating,blood won’t find a way out.
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About the writer
Donald Illich. Donald Illich has published poetry in journals such as The Iowa Review, Fourteen Hills, and Cold Mountain Review. He won Honorable Mention in the Washington Prize book contest. He recently published a chapbook, The Art of Dissolving.
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