The Occasional Poem

*This post and this poem are dedicated to my friend Patricia Laster on her 90th birthday; she inspires me immensely.

COLONIAL CEMETERY
Savannah, Georgia

The families of the buried dead
commissioned monuments to last
until the final trumpet sounds,
but after four generations
marble slabs are worn smooth,
covered in moss and grime.

Granite, it’s claimed, will last forever,
but we can’t know the truth of that,
and who will seek my grave
two hundred years from now?

Better these poems, I think,
to keep my memory alive.
Better still to love a child,
or your neighbor as yourself.

“For the trumpet shall sound, and the dead
shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.”
1 Corinthians 15:52

My book, SLOW RIVERS, can be ordered through your local bookstore or online via bookshop.org. (ISBN 979-8-218-43822-7).

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