I've never understood benches in graveyards.
we sit on them and grieve over a lost life
that we can no longer see.
I wonder if the dead sit by us
and grieve over the life that we
are wasting as we sit next to them.

maybe the benches are for the dead.
maybe it's so they can sit beside us
and comfort us when we cry out their name.
I wonder if they sit there and think,
"why me? why am I here and not there?"

maybe the benches are for the living.
maybe it's so they can sit down when
their bodies are too weak to stand.
perhaps it's because it makes them
feel closer to their loved
one's permanent home in the earth.
I wonder if they sit there and think,
"why me? why am I here and not there?"

I've never understood benches in graveyards.
maybe we sit there next to ghosts
with common interests
and no way to comfort each other.
maybe the benches are there so
the living and the dead can
ask the same questions
and wonder the same things
and from worlds apart
not feel so alone.

a.d.