the dead

the gravestones,
are tilted and thin,
concrete wafers
with engraved
script names
and numbers
smoothed out by
time and weather,
fragile in the wind.
they lie in a narrow
shaded parcel of
land in odd rows.
but take away
the preserved
church, the trim
painted gloss white,
the brick sidewalk
swept and clean,
and manicured
lawn, take away
the rose bushes that
line the way and the
priest in his satin
black robe and
you see that it's
a bleak place to lie
below the ground.
with the traffic
so close, the buses,
the stores,
the rush of life
cutting through
the cemetary
to save time,
paying the dead
and their eternal
graves no mind.