NEPTUNE BURNS

a funeral viewing

On the night of my grandfather's open casket I imagined I could see your ghost treading through the halls of the funeral home
I could see the girl who made me her fish-girl tumble out of the ashes of a nearby urn
Lunge with fists of charred hair and powdered bones at my legs
Knocking me black blue as I felt your fingers exhale on my shoulder
Pumping hearts began to rain from the ceiling and smashed red and tar-like on relatives whispering prayers said only when they feared mortality
And all the same all I saw was my grandfather who could no longer wink at me as if to share in my hallucinations
The dead hearts of twenty-seven people pumped to a tune that flattered as pebbles against marble and sang to the melody of a mourner's sobs gaining rapture as the screams rose to a shattering screech till this growing growing need of devastation robbed of air grew to a
h  a  l  t  i  n  g   crescendo
Taking off with the beat of a death march sung under the lilt of murmured piano notes from the wedding march
My grandmother watched my grandfather's hollowed body dressed in an outfit she selected weeks in advance in a coffin picked a month in advance in a dress she had picked an hour before we left home
I watched and wondered why no one could hear the cacophony of hearts pitter-pattering around us like macabre hummingbirds
I watched and wondered how can imaginary hearts be more real more alive than my grandfather
How can his once warm touch echo in my rib cage like yours does -
and how is it his dead body holds more real space in time than the ghost of you that haunts me when I hear the sound of my own heart
beating?

For skytaints who is marvelous, talented, & kind