Rachel bleached her hair to
Mark the end of something silver -

To counteract the epitaph

An eternal "I was here, and I didn't want to leave"

It all washed up on shore, dead
The same summer most of us
Gave up on God and gave into one another
Or those saints found below the belt

Death is not the color black
It's water growing gradually stagnant, yellow
A slow crawl on all fours to the finish line or a sunset swallow
The faded leather found sourrounding your veracious belt loop

And then there's Elizabeth
Storming down the church aisle to call the whole order off
She'd return to the dive bars in red lipstick
And break hearts through notes written in checkbooks

Cosmic chaos comforts
The living in regard to the dead
We have faith in stardust and song lyrics
A road map, phone number sent through the telescope at a camp sight

But caskets close and
Bodies burn
They scatter on hilltops and
Scream out in stereo

Sleepless slumbers remain
For Rachel and this is her
Peroxide obituary
For a mother gone too soon

The flowers were beautiful
I know this because I have been told so
They do not look very different to me
Different from the grass they grow between
Not the soil they sprout in
Not the small world thriving beneath
Nor the sky and trees sourrounding
Everything seems the same to me
And if these worldly beauties are compared
It would not do justice to the infinite degree
In which everything is beautiful.