The Poetry, Essays and Personal Journals of Larry L. Dill
A new poem by Larry L. Dill
In the leafy Montford neighborhood of Asheville
The grateful dead are buried on the hillsides
And in the meadows of an old cemetery.
Most of the gray gravestones are tilted left or right,
Scattered here and there
Among the trees--suggesting age and neglect and solitude.
One leans like the pine beside it which has
Gotten off course over the years
As our old bodies do. Pushed by wind and rain,
Pulled ever downward by the earth,
It seems to be following the tree’s trajectory,
Its inscriptions are no longer legible. Its history is forgotten.
It is going back to mother earth.
The dogwoods are blooming among the scattered graves.
Birds are singing. The air is crisp and clean.
Dandelions dance in the wind.
Soldier’s Field is different. It is a quiet slope on the south edge of the cemetery. The gravestones stand erect
And in formation. Their uniquenesses are lost in a sea of order.
The dead are grateful, the story goes,
When they have been properly laid to rest.
But we, the living, don’t know for certain what “proper” really is.
Even Jesus said, “Let the dead bury their dead.”*
A pretty young jogger passes by and smiles at me
as I peruse the stones.
She is an angel I am sure and her message to me
Is as clear as the blue sky.
“You’ll be fine,” she says with her eyes.
“You’ll be fine.”
*Matthew 8:22
The Premier Edition of the New Hope Journal in Asheville, N.C.
April 2010
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copyright 2007 by Larry L. Dill