ASHES IN THE RIVER
( Lee Bridge ... James River ... September 1993 )
Published in The Poet's Domain, Volume Twenty-Three, 2007 Edition
Copyright © 1996, 2007 by
Jason Lester Atkins
985 Fleet Drive, #347
Virginia Beach, VA 23454
All Rights Reserved.
Look up
To see me flying free
Among the laughing spirit creatures
Dancing
Under the gracefully curving Lee.
Above,
A traveling choir of traffic lanes
Hums goodbye songs for me,
While
I look down on this stage
All set to play the final scene
And speak last lines you can hear
As whispering windsong through the cable screen.
Watch now
The costumed performing priest.
His robe follows the wind blow.
His eyes are fixed on the rivers flow,
Tossing,
My fat green funeral urn
Down to the rocks below.
See
Mama standing beside my son,
My son holding his sister's hand,
Grandma clinging to the grapple rail,
All audience for the priest's tale.
My friends
All standing in a swaying motion,
As I
Follow my own gray ash
Crawling
Slowly back to the beginning ocean.
Some Information About the Above Poem
Written in 1996 in Memory of the Funeral of my Nephew, Reginald Barrack, son of Bernice and Francis Barrack.
Jason Lester Atkins, November 8, 2004.
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