Rainy Season -- Day 13

[Pallbearers by Br. Lawrence Lew, O.P.]

[The Pallbearer Reflects]

Death in the morning makes a poor breakfast. 
Makes you never want to eat again.

We ask ourselves 'Were they always so small? 
So light? 
I remember a much taller man.
I remember a woman made of stone.' 
And the grave, why so huge? 
If we could could slide our dead
between the spaces in the rocks
or fold them
neatly
into crab holes,
if we didn't have to dig graves in the ground
as big as the spaces in our hearts
and in stead just let the marching ants
handle the procession,
then what would man do with all this grief? 
We can't really walk around with it. 
We can't really walk at all. 
Its too great a thing, this rock of sorrow
on our chests,
weighing down our ribs
and only letting us breathe deep enough
to shudder,
to weep again. 
These chains make our hands useless
except for wringing. 
These feet are bound to pacing
through halls and empty bedrooms
like ghosts. 
And at that point
we might as well be.