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

Last Anthem
by Michael R. Burch

Where you have gone are the shadows falling...
does memory pale
like a fossil in shale
...do you not hear me calling?

Where you have gone do the shadows lengthen...
does memory wane
with the absence of pain
...is silence at last your anthem?

Keywords/Tags: elegy, eulogy, epitaph, death, grave, Sheol, shadows, silence, eternity, funeral, memory, memorial, tribute

Why are you so alive
When I'm dead in the eyes
Knee deep in a grave
My casket of lies

Raise an Inferno against Corona
As if no one cares, but here is a
Solution that is within the flora
Of Darkness.Be bold, never be frail
At this young age. Be strong as we trail
And track those ancestral shrine
Let's wage war against corona
It's is real, let's feel the pain of that
Pandemic. Raise awareness
Who could ponder fearlessly?
To reduce bitterness of the threat
The panic is too much, we can't bear it
How could we bear it?. I am felling it.
That fuster flow in frugal frivolity
Imagine! Who to follow?, What to do?
Which medical measure could you
Follow?, When there large fossil of
Fake news flowing. Be combatant!
Be mentally armed. Be a militant!
Raise awareness against Corona
Raise an inferno against Corona
Stay Home, let it burn from stigma
Let it soul strive in hotly magma
Never be fussed neither be panic
None been bemused. Be that  mic
With the loudest voice from falsehoods
Approach corses with clean immunity
Start it at the grassroots, link society
Let them new the deathly effects of
Corona. Tell them, let them raise an
Inferno against Coronavirus.

The Gardener’s Roses
by Michael R. Burch

Mary Magdalene, supposing him to be the gardener, saith unto him, “Sir, if thou have borne him hence, tell me where thou hast laid him, and I will take him away.”

I too have come to the cave;
within: strange, half-glimpsed forms
and ghostly paradigms of things.
Here, nothing warms

this lightening moment of the dawn,
pale tendrils spreading east.
And I, of all who followed Him,
by far the least . . .

The women take no note of me;
I do not recognize
the men in white, the gardener,
these unfamiliar skies . . .

Faint scent of roses, then—a touch!
I turn, and I see: You.
My Lord, why do You tarry here:
Another waits, Whose love is true?

Although My Father waits, and bliss;
though angels call—ecstatic crew!—
I gathered roses for a Friend.
I waited here, for You.

NOTE: I do not believe in Jesus as a “sacrifice” to a primitive “god” who demands the blood of innocents in order to “forgive” sins of his own making through a ghoulish "atonement." But I will not completely discount the hope that love can transcend death, although, like Thomas, I will have to see it to believe it. Keywords/Tags: Jesus, Christ, cave, grave, tomb, gardener, roses, angels, resurrection, Mary, Magdalene, love, heaven

There lays a man
In a shallow grave
He's Alone, cold to the bone
And there's nothing remarkable
On his gravestone

The dirt all around him smooth
He wants out
But is unable to move
He tries to speak
He tries to scream
But his body refuses

His mind starts racing
Am I alive?
Did I already die?
Am I here for an eternity?
Will I ever be free?

Memories begin to fade
Bones become colder
Vision darkens
And he begins to sleep

Years later
He awakes and finds himself alone
He's cold to the bone
He wants out
But is unable to move
He tries to speak
He tries to scream
But his body refuses
His mind begins to race
Am I alive?
Did I already die?
Will I ever be free?
Am I here for an eternity?

The cycle repeats
Such is the life
Of humanity.

Today,
I’ve dug a thousand graves for every
funeral that rose inside my heart,

and tomorrow will be a continuation
of this never-ending sorrowful funeral

And the only one
who’s grieving
my aching bones
is me,
and me alone