Wake Poem by Christian Carbone

the long haunting dirge
one endless note of the
organ as they walk to the
mass grave the only black
I’m wearing are my shoes
and inside

they’re personalities all so
different worlds apart the more
popular names all ready passed
on now the barely heard must
descend to complete the cycle
of birth and eternal silence never
again to pass on a point of view
or comical anecdote

just before the ebony doors close
I reach in reach down the well
for a gift a guiding light yearning
to bring all in desperation somehow
up from the drowning sea…

eight books for five bucks

the gray-haired bookstore
owner seems sad but the
gray-haired cat just
yawns