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michael Jun 2020
Rain drops shell station road
Hurst turns point thirty three
Degrees north-west-west. See,
The quiet stones ahead

Lower the lead scarred flesh,
The soul of this marred son,
Into the dirt it laboured.

How many times should
Gorgythion's root-stem
Lose its petal-wreathed head?
Alek Mielnikow May 2020
We finish digging our graves, dug
to what we consider three feet, but
we don’t worry about measurements.

These deaths are negligible.

Coated in dirt and sweat and heaving,
we gaze at each other. We both nod,
toss our shovels aside and walk over
to our bodies. He grabs his by the wrist
and drags it across the grass. I hoist
mine into my arms and shuffle over.

They’re both dumped into the graves,
and we fill both the holes. He walks to
his car without hesitation. I pause a
moment to glare at my grave, but I don’t
offer a eulogy or prayer, only standing
there in silence. I catch up to him, throw
my shovel in the trunk, and we drive off.

He drops me at my home, and I go inside
to find my wife watching TV. My wife? I
blink, trying to focus. Yes, she is my wife.
She says “Hey honey”, and I respond with
a low “Hey”, but she doesn’t look over,
does not notice the mess. I ***** up the
stairs, counting the steps, and start a shower.

As the water warms, the mirror reveals
someone familiar. No, not familiar, this is
me. I get under the warm stream, letting it
clean away what is left of me.

-
by Aleksander Mielnikow | Alek the Poet
Alek Mielnikow Mar 2020
When you take the soil,
do you grab a handful,
or just a bit?

Is your nose sluggish,
or has it been days since
you’ve cried and you
smell the petrichor?

Do you listen to the priest
offering prayers? Or do you
turn hollow and hear only
your heartbeat?

Do you mutter a message,
grant your final send-off?
When you let go, do you
unfurl your hand and let it
drop like a heavy weight
leaving your open palm?
Does it seep between your
fingers and out of your hand?

Or are you swift, silent, eager
to advance the procession?
Do you toss it, as if sending
a ship off to sea?

Do you believe the carcass
beneath that pine lid cherishes
your gesture? Or do you do this
for yourself, for solidarity with
those with you? Do you think
there’s a difference?

When you take the soil,
do you grab a handful,
or just a bit?


-
by Aleksander Mielnikow | Alek the Poet
N Jul 2019
It is brutal
to have reached for
my trembling hand
and hold it

only to dust me off
back to my grave
without a goodbye
nor a burial

It is cruel
to have made me
believe I am one
with the livings

only to make my
second death
far more ******

O, tragedy indeed
Bhill Mar 2020
hello
this is him
no I don't need a burial plot
what's wrong with you people
how did you get this number
what
the obits
no way
I'm not dead yet...

Brian Hill - 2020 # 65
Bad phone call...
No, I'm not dead!
Carlo C Gomez Oct 2019
Dream of liberated fields,
Producing penicillin
And choking life out of
The cholera of gunfire.
Don't fear words summoned
At the grave,
They describe places we only
Wish there'd been time to
Know more intimately.
This hour of reflection is then
Half the battle
--the battle no one wins.
"Soldier on, ossuary!
Soldier on!"
Perhaps, we've reached
The nadir of the Hopewell.

How could we not?
Chris Saitta Jul 2019
Therein lies the fur, filled with running wind,
Milkweed in the scruff, the scent of wild-wood,
Some mystery-hearted forest where pulse begins.
Therein lies the Centaur, satyr, and god-disguised swan,
Ageless wonders prowled upon by an age-old Parthenon.
You broke your wolf’s tooth through those haunches of lore.

Therein lies the fur, filled with barking dust and dandelion war,
With a spine that stretched back to the she-wolf and city-birth,
The peeled nerve of a howl once tremored your Aurelian lips.
Therein lies the serf, hunter, fairer hand, and lord,
From wattles and daub, the wandering-sands of Saracen, or Crusader’s moor.
You kept the path beside to remind that instinct shines as the holiest earth.

Therein lies the fur, the warm, ungovernable peasant of sleep,
Ever prophetic in your skies by eyeshut-trace of the hunting moon,
Twitching at the day’s thousand faces, all asleep in themselves.
Therein lies the soldier, nurse, chaplain, and fell-prayer,
Mange-like war is the whimpering season with its flea-bitten welts of stars.
You struck blind but true at the throat of gas-hissing war.

Therein lies the fur, outracing the rain and the spout,
Nested with more birds and Autumn song than rain,
Your sleeping ear pooled like cool eaves of the barn.

I sing once more like a boy into your unfolded ear.
Listen always for my ancient, choral voice and your chores of play,
And race earback to the sun in the belly-grass of your free-eyed fields.
Leave your last paw mark, torn on the red clay of my hand.
You are forever wrapped in human touch, ageless and aged,
And if ever the dark in madder darkness encroaches,
Leave black eternity to my faithful eyes.
For Dingo, dog of war.
Badshah Khan Apr 2019
Rubayiat Al Thurab (Verses of the Dust) – 87

BismillahIr RahmanIr Raheem

Oh my Beloved!
With your divine presence’
In the barren garden’
Whole garden started to flourish.

When I naturally suspect,’
The divine presence of you’
I am universally seeing the gazing light’
All over the barren garden.

Oh my Beloved!
This minute, I rest peacefully’
Within your divine presence.

In my sacred burial ground
Which is correctly located
At this barren garden!

Allah Khair….. Khairul Rabul Alameen Yah Arrahmanur Yah Raheem

Ummah Thurab – Badshah Khan.
©UT-BK 2019
Rubayiat Al Thurab (Verses of the Dust)
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