🕯️ The Morgue

Suddenly, the murmurs fall still —

as a pond might still itself

when breath beneath the water

ceases.

A hush spreads,

a contagious grief,

a heart pierced through —

its wound burns deeper.

I speak softly to those

who never learned themselves.

Each soul, I tell them,

is born again —

in another body,

in another land,

beneath another sky.

The stars flicker faintly above;

to those who’ve lost their stars,

I whisper,

“Look upward —

there, far away.”

Time flows on,

and forgetful hearts forget.

In the morgue,

beneath a dim narcotic haze,

the undertaker

fails to know his own child.

Each lifeless body,

had it breath, would ask,

“How fares my little boy?”

With death, the name dissolves,

the warmth fades.

Will he never return?

The father wonders —

his heart as helpless

as a child’s.

Perhaps with age

we search again

for our lost childhood.

Yet grief never leaves the road;

it follows quietly,

devouring joy,

deeper and deeper still.