Jupp, Brandham, Whipp, Engel and Burnese
all gone

gray trees melting into dull skies
pine needles on soft
loamy ground
wet leaves brown
moss encased stones
proclaiming the dead
tears etched in granite
forming stories lives epitaphs

Trebilcock, Newton, Wellings, Rows and Fletcher
all gone

white birch with black scars
stretching arthritically skyward
piercing birdsounds rolling over
the dull day
chilling hint of the smell of the dead
reaching up from the decades

Bloxam, Juniper, Bamford, Scott and Russell
all gone

broken solemn statuary
standing mute testament to
the nevermore embraced
crooked crumbling markers
once regal monuments fallen to the years

McKnight, Sinclair, Muir, Yeates and Ames
all gone

great brown owl swooping
silhouetted against the grainy heavens
tormented by a cacophony of croaking crows
harassed from one tree to another
until they lose interest in its fear
and noisily scatter

Hollows, Hughes, Foxcroft, Hunt and Armstrong
all gone

grinding thudding scraping diesel sounds
backhoe preparing another short future
sighs sobs aches emptiness
gleaming coffin green tarp brown earth
eulogy
words spoken into a bleak silence
retreating footsteps

Jordan, Welsh, O'Brian, Stewart and Liberty
gone now all gone

A deep drawn breath
An ocean of smiles
A mountain of memories
A dream half-reach’d
A life unlived
Please
Please
Just a little more time . . .

©RG Liberty
January, 1995