A silent witness to the past
post mortem speeches are heard though
voiced, forensic pathologists,
interpreting skeletal terms,
poems from the ossuary.
Though archaeology, from earth,
with partner, anthropology,
through pollen types, and isotopes,
in unity of place and time –
they draw a story from a corpse.
Olecranon or ribcage bars,
from fissures’ issue in the skull,
the charnel house has much to say
where even mute speak when they’re dead,
reminding us, those passed have tongues.
We should rehearse, our verse inside,
like the exhumation of self,
so find the heart, emotion’s store,
release the rhythmic, pumping flow,
before too late, memoriam.
Marked reverence and remembrance,
engraved as words cut into stone,
with even some poetic crumb,
will tumble, crumble, dust to dust,
but never buried, stanza’s call.
Stephen Kingsnorth (Cambridge M.A., English & Religious Studies), retired to Wales, UK, from ministry in the Methodist Church due to Parkinson’s Disease, has had pieces curated and published by on-line poetry sites, printed journals and anthologies, including Poetry Potion. He has, like so many, been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net. His blog is at https://poetrykingsnorth.wordpress.com