Graveyard Pie
(1942-1997)
David Keller
A joke, the ragged cemetery we'd come
to look at
has filled up with this season's
chokeberry
and goldenrod. Blueberry bushes
between the headstones are covered
with fruit.
"Formaly (sic) from Stowe, Vt" one
says and, on the back,
"Murdered by Samuel Mills." Some
have no names.
At the lodge a bicycle leans on the
porch.
An occasional truck, a carload of
tourists
passes on its way to or from this
small town.
I watch, hoping to remember later.
In two days we have to leave.
Tonight
we will eat together around the long
table
with our combined centuries of study
and writing
and the blueberries three of us
picked.
I love these people and their good
laughter,
though I will lose them, and because
they hope
to meet again--like a minesweeper crew
from the war
growing more grey-haired each year.
After dinner we will go to hear poetry
read under the lights, the mice
listening
behind the beams. Again we fill
ourselves
on what the dead leave us, what they
become:
old songs and bits of laughter, squash
with onions, corn,
wine, a good salad, and a piece of
graveyard pie.
