• WAITING IMPATIENTLY

    Waiting rooms are usually somber.That is true of most hospitalsand every mortuary. It isn’t like we needto be prepared for whatmight happen next. In the hospital the surgeon,at the direction of lawyers,has given us the worst case. In the mortuary we are certainthe departed was no saintso resurrection is out of the picture. I’m not…


  • DUST AND ASHES

    Between Scylla and Charybdisthey cower amidst the ruinsfearful to look skywardlest they encouragethe rains of hell. Now and then they visitthe corpses, hastily buriedgrief drowned by the soundof the laugh of the gunnerpeering down from the hills.It is always night for the souland lookout must be keptfor Charon, who ridessilently along the rivers of blood,that…


  • SKELETONS

    Their corpses have been gathering dust in the closet where I keep them, in boxes, once neatly labeled, but the collection has grown so large I’ve given up any attempt at organization. I do, periodically, take a glance into the boxes, take a few out and carefully consider them, but heeding the proscription, I always…