FUNERAL

The women in fashionable black
are chatting outside the
Riverside Memorial Chapel.
The service must be over,
because they're making off
with the flower arrangements
like guests after a wedding.
"At least she came, by God,"
I hear one of them say as I pass.
As opposed to whom, I wonder?
What heartless friend or relative
had not shown up?
I turn to see the faces of these stern judges
trading opinions on this,
someone else's judgment day.
The speaker is a tense, agitated woman,
nervously smoking.
A man is replying
with intense eyes and gestures.
Two young women at the fringes of the group
are smiling, laughing.
No tears,
no dabbing of Kleenex.
A baby has just woken up
in its stroller.
A husband pulls up at the curb
and calls out from the car.
We all move on.


© Ellen Azorin