It Happens That One Cemetery Contains Another

Choral folk, canadian accent, recto tono, calm, whisdom, Echo, ‑Opera, ‑bel canto, ‑tremolo, ‑vibrato, ‑folkloric, ‑pathetic, ‑agressive, ‑shouting, ‑theatrical, ‑dramatic

It happens that one cemetery contains another,
as two strips of adjoining land
might contain, on either side,
the remains belonging to two communities
that keep to themselves in matters of liturgy.

It happens that one cemetery contains another, the phenomenon of grief is so complex and subterranean, rising from the groundwater of the collective subconscious and from an experiential journey in which one hopes for heaven,

I remember, at sixteen,
a summer job where I was in charge
of mowing the lawn and burying the dead
in a neighborhood cemetery.
I had just made perfectly rectangular,
with a shovel, the hole of a grave.

Climbing out of the pit,
with the fright of my life
as my feet slowly sank
into the softened steel
of a catafalque’s roof,
I saw, at the cemetery gate,
the hearse arriving
with a dozen flower vans
for a member of the local mafia — a young man —
accompanied by his brothers.

One of them grabbed me by the collar
and pushed me, saying:
“You’re not the one burying my brother,
it’s us.”
There were four of them,
answering the shovel.

We live in such a murderous age
that the blood of the victims of the first
had not yet dried in that
of the Second World War,
while Korea extended its dish
to Vietnam,
as Russian soldiers
were lacing their boots to invade Ukraine,
and Netanyahu was genociding Gaza
under Trump’s indulgent eye,
both soles already wet
with the blood of the wars in Africa.

When grief arises
along our earthly journey,
it happens that the death of a parent
also contains the grief of a friendship,
which pours itself into that
of a failed love,
which pours again
into that of a companion animal,
thrown off course by the grief of an abortion,
which in turn compresses
the grief of abandoning a career
because of the grief
of failing health.

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It happens that one cemetery contains another, as two strips of adjoining land might contain, on either side, the remains belonging to two communities that keep to themselves in matters of liturgy. It happens that one cemetery contains another, the phenomenon of grief is so complex and subterranean, rising from the groundwater of the collective subconscious and from an experiential journey in which one hopes for heaven, I remember, at sixteen, a summer job where I was in charge of mowing the lawn and burying the dead in a neighborhood cemetery. I had just made perfectly rectangular, with a shovel, the hole of a grave. Climbing out of the pit, with the fright of my life as my feet slowly sank into the softened steel of a catafalque’s roof, I saw, at the cemetery gate, the hearse arriving with a dozen flower vans for a member of the local mafia — a young man — accompanied by his brothers. One of them grabbed me by the collar and pushed me, saying: “You’re not the one burying my brother, it’s us.” There were four of them, answering the shovel. It happens that one cemetery contains another, the phenomenon of grief is so complex and subterranean, rising from the groundwater of the collective subconscious and from an experiential journey in which one hopes for heaven, We live in such a murderous age that the blood of the victims of the first had not yet dried in that of the Second World War, while Korea extended its dish to Vietnam, as Russian soldiers were lacing their boots to invade Ukraine, and Netanyahu was genociding Gaza under Trump’s indulgent eye, both soles already wet with the blood of the wars in Africa. It happens that one cemetery contains another, the phenomenon of grief is so complex and subterranean, rising from the groundwater of the collective subconscious and from an experiential journey in which one hopes for heaven, When grief arises along our earthly journey, it happens that the death of a parent also contains the grief of a friendship, which pours itself into that of a failed love, which pours again into that of a companion animal, thrown off course by the grief of an abortion, which in turn compresses the grief of abandoning a career because of the grief of failing health. It happens that one cemetery contains another, the phenomenon of grief is so complex and subterranean, rising from the groundwater of the collective subconscious and from an experiential journey in which one hopes for heaven.

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