December 14, 2003

THE NUMBERED DEAD

in Auburn fields
we found new adventures
beyond the gates of life

in Auburn fields
we found new adventures
beyond the gates of life

3 poets - Longfellow, James Russell Lowell
and Oliver Wendell Holmes
but not a line of verse

maybe I will return
with some bronze plaques
inscribed with my favorite lines

I am filled with a new thirst
for sung rhymes and metered song
in this valley of the requiem

lamentable though it be
we must transgress
into the very fields of death
to find a solitary peace

here in Mt Auburn
the dead are numbered.
Is this ungracious?
liberated from ID’s and
social security
there last bank checks inscribed
they thought they were free

but unkindly architects
chiselled 2493 and 3224
where they lie

they thought they were free
but still they are numbers
of the numbered dead

the Latin is softer - mortuus
but the Anglo-Saxon is final

dead sounds like
done
or
dumb
or
dull

in Auburn fields
we found 3 poets
Longfellow, Lowell and Holmes.

Posted by larrykeegan at December 14, 2003 11:06 PM