Phobia Poem by Patti Masterman

Phobia



When Grandpa died
We went to the funeral home
There was a funeral to plan,
And a casket to select
To hold Grandpa's mortal remains.
We were sorely fragile with shock.

The world was loud with a new reality
Which we were trying to absorb
But in the too quiet room of caskets,
We were reminded again, this was not a dream.
Even though Grandpa was old,
He had not been ill; sudden death took him away.

Which as it turns out, must be the best kind of death
As the funeral director spoke
About sturdiness of caskets, longevity of containers,
Problems of moisture, and the impermeability of vaults
His words became just a murmur, in some far off place
All I could hear was the roar inside my own brain.

I watched the spider crawling, hiding itself in the cushioned
Interior of the casket: the chosen casket
The one Grandpa would be spending his eternity in-
The very one the spider would probably be inhabiting
For the rest of it's spider life. I made a quick motion
Of revulsion, and everyone glanced at me-
And so I could not dismember a coffin then, to oust a spider.

My nightmare, the spider finding a home upon Grandpa
Down in the stifling dark, in the unending night of the cemetery vault.
Perhaps the funeral home deliberately placed a spider
In the cheapest models, to dissuade grieving mourners-
'Don't buy the cheap models; they all have spiders'
From their errant habits of frugality after death.

But that was not a thought that would have occurred,
To a sixteen year old girl, who was phobic of spiders
Because I too had been paralyzed by death's venom.

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