VALE

Rosewood.  The silver handles

will be removed before the fire

but the flowers on the lid,

dust of incense, drops of holy water

will remain, keep his body company –

our final, inadequate benediction.

Now the process is anonymous –

the coffin sinks:

the men who light and they who stoke,

who slide it into the oven,

are without names

and they don’t know his.

We knew and he knew the cancer’s name:

it was devilishly clever,

relentless, finding its obstructing way

around stents and into lumens.

It declared conquest over his unconscious form

last Friday.  Pyrrhic, it seemed to me.

After the mass and committal, we who are left

assemble outside in the winter wind

view one another’s wrinkles

take note of obvious infirmities

count ourselves lucky to be alive –

well – sort of.

de Chardin said as we grow old

we are increasingly penalized

for a crime we did not commit.

But the punishment is for our original sin,

of being born, of our temerity

in playing gods for three score years and ten.