from a eulogy, by a poet, of a poet:

she rewinds the years for the dead

to a time he sat around a campfire with the ancient ones, singing,

"old songs written by broken men in love with their own vanishing nature..."

and it hits me, I am now among their ranks

proudly proclaiming, I am Natan Lupan, the grey wolf

yet seeing more a shivering coyote in morning's mirror

no noble howl to greet the day, but scripting what I will say,

to a world of faces, without whose feigned graces,
I would be put out to pasture

they see the white beard, the thinning mane, and wonder why I am still among them

then they decide where to go to lunch

without me, but I do not lament this loss

broken sons, long lost lovers, buried friends, and a Medicare card trump such trivial slights

they know nothing of my pitiable past

nor do they care--they weren't there
when my Elysian dreams and grandiose schemes
were born, and died

now a darkness approaches, and I fear I face it alone

though a borrowed line reminds me,
others have been there before...

sitting around a fire in the night,
mesmerized by flames that flap gold wings for short flight, then become red embers when men take sleep

when morning's cold ashes are lifted by the wind, I hope the songs we sang will be their celestial waltz

my cell phone, my Kindle, my desktop
if I die intestate?

what will willfully addresses the solemn secrets of silicon?

(and woe be to me if my last call is a wrong number, my last Facebook entry an unanswered political jab)

will anybody bother to delete my files
after I am deleted?

or is that the new immortality--for apoptosis does not apply to photons,
electrons and "lol"s

I bet when limbo, heaven and hell were conceived, not a soul would have believed, a hard drive in the sky would one day keep us all alive, indefinitely...

dead doe on the baked prairie grass,
buzzards circling overhead

we're in lawn chairs, downing Buds,
waiting for the feeding to begin

but Donny is impatient, expecting
the birds to dine on his schedule

NOW, this very second, while they
are riding the currents above

watching, waiting to see if we move
closer to our ****

Donny curses them: **** dumb
birds, I shot that deer for you

he shoots at the kettle, but they continue
long loops, unperturbed

Donny again cusses the buzzards
and shoots the doe again

as if killing her twice will hasten
the descent of the birds

Donny complains sweat is stinging
his eyes

he pours the last of our water over
his head and removes his shirt

near sundown we are out of beer
and Donny is asleep

one by one the birds land, until the wake
is feasting before me

talons, beaks at work, tugging, tearing;
the eyes the appetizers it seems

I don't wake Donny, though I know he will be mad
for missing this meal

hungry as he was for a blood mass, but,
I'll let my brother sleep

while the shadows of skillful sculptors  
grow longer on the plain

and the fawn becomes a crimson work
of art Donny would never appreciate

I did not hear
the owl call my name,
nor the hawk squawk
before it dive-bombed me
from the tree line, not
twice, but thrice this
white hot prairie day
yes, there are those who
will say, I came too close
to its nest, and with the rest
of species I must share this space,
but had my staff been swifter the
third time it dove, there
would be a grounded raptor
in the grove, this less than
lovely afternoon

I found your solitary grave:

a "t" bound by twine--two sticks from a mesquite

no name, your eulogy likely the
high desert winds,

and perchance a disappointed caw from a vulture for you were covered well

deep in dirt, hard work for any steel,
but after the toil

your grave digger took time to craft
a crucifix

otherwise, I would have stepped on your
grave,

an ignorant desecration averted by love's anonymous labor,

and the ancient blood on the cross

you were there, smiling,
greeting me with a handshake, a half hug

your band was preparing to play
for a wedding, a celebration within a celebration

the chair was never there, the one
you kicked from under your feet, forty years past

I wish...but we know it was,
and we know a young bride found you hanging

suspended in a time we called simpler
though it wasn't--suffering still our common denominator

but last night, in my slanderous slumber  
I defied the fates, brought you back to life

one where the chair, the cord were never
there, and you didn't take this life's longest leap

the thirty three inches through a silent
air, where you landed with muted screams

only to return in dreams, to say you were
doing well, without the woe of all these years

the rest of us were left to endure

little remains
of my grandfather's house:
raw rafters, warped planks with hints
my uncle invested in paint

the windows all gone, time
and twisters took them, and much
of the roof--what is left of that sags,
a silent submission to gravity

a woodstove survives, cold
to the touch, with no memory
of the fire it once birthed, the precious
prairie timber which fed it

now it knows only mourning
doves' song; winged squatters
unperturbed by my presence, as if
they know I lay no claim to now

the old boards have stories
I will never hear: the birth of babes,
reading the Word by kerosene lamps,
the last breaths of men

the songbirds may know,
but they woo the living in flight--a
future of nesting and fertile eggs; they
owe no belated dirge to long lost kin