I met my mother’s biological father, my ‘grandfather’, at his funeral.
Foul feelings, petty and futile.
Killer-stare, I look corpses dead in the eye.
So, I, shut his sight-lid, the iris; blinded the guy.
(I’ve got issues; you need to subscribe. Can’t just kind-of-buy.)
But no disrespect to the departed, I came to bid the old man a goodbye.
Or maybe that’s a lie.
I buried my soiled hand deep in his casket for a handshake.
But the unawake, unaware of my extended greetings
cannot reach out.
This is awkward for me; at a celebration of a life I never knew.
A human I never loved.
New family,
folk I need to find familiar fields with.
A couple of assets left –
liquor store and a taxi business ‒
varying facets.
Your widowing wife’s children introduce themselves
to your other, other, other offspring that you had left
to collect dust on the shelves.
That you left to collect dust of the shelves.
That you left on the shelves to collect dust on themselves.
How often babies are left paternal-parental-orphan is why June 19 is backyard coffin.
You were Mr Misappropriation-of-Trust.
Our Sovereign Lord speaks, in whispers, of offering forgiveness
even when and where it was never requested.
The gospel youth sermon says that the dirt
will return to the earth.
Men show each other the men’s restroom; I never saw you at the urinal.
But back to the burial.
The Doves’ services hearse driving your body to the cemetery, your resting place.
I hope the Lion’s Gates open unto you with a loved-filled roar.
I hope you find an angel that’s your greater half like bettered bilateral symmetry,
even I would hate to see you afterlife live alone.
Consider this my flowers on your tombstone,
as you push daisies in the gardens.
I planted a tree on top of you today,
may the good fruit fall far from the tree.
And the boy-child never to age and be his father’s son,
But a son’s father.
| a poem by nublaccsoul from Chickens Laying Eggs on The Roof (2019)