The Gathering

                Compartmented us,

devised into groups and finished with rose-

wood, apart, together, blue-

prints of a deathbed imposed upon tradition;

                a family of funerals, made

with years of rings in the wood of trade,

today built for a funeral in-house –

we measure our hours with grief

                and plane them until tear-

marked and smooth, a section at a time,

tasks delegated; polishing the handles

that we will hold to carry it, fining

                the finest finish of edges,

tissues of sandpaper burning our eyes; we

must not wipe our noses on this, nor

count the grief in knots and dovetails

                as a father sets varnish to brass

and a mother holds his hand over hand and

spreads the gleaming light to the coffin-sides;

sons and daughters standing in reflection.