Lawrence Hall
Mhall46184@aol.com
Dispatches for the Colonial Office

                            Graveside Service on a Blustery Day

               “The old order changeth, yielding place to new”

                           -Tennyson, Idylls of the King

The widower assisted to his place
Mourners in unaccustomed dresses and suits
A bible, leaflets fluttering in the wind
And gangly teens unsure what they should do

February clouds roiling and boiling
Even the officiant’s words are blown away
Prayers lifted into silence by the wind
They may have fallen by the gravediggers’ tractor

Or were blown through the leaning chain-link fence
Into the deeply darkening Grendel-woods

But still – in back –
                                                 a boy and a girl shyly touch hands