Challenging Poetry

we will yet sing together

for Caleb

for five days,
we sang to him—sang
of love and teddy bears
of safety and home.

we sang lullabies he didn't need
because he didn't wake.
we sang happy and sad
and confused and terrified.

we sang waiting beside his cot.
we sang dry eyes and tired feet.
we sang the beat of the heart monitor.
we sang the rhythm of the ventilator.

we sang until our
voices died with him.
we sang his funeral
with cried out eyes.

someday, we'll meet again
past death's veil,
and he will know us
by our voices.

April 14—An elegy

note ▶︎

As with many poems I've written, this is for my nephew who died at five days old. He was born 18 April 2012--nine years ago this year