Wills and Probates

by sibyllene   Sep 18, 2012


Two dollars for the gravedigger.
Three on a Sunday, to put
the hole in the ground. To take a cold
shovel in tattered leather gloves, to push
hard against the frozen soil, to feel it pierce,
finally, yield in chunks and crumbles. Pay
so he will make this dream in the earth for
pine and dead flowers, for old bones, young
hearts, broken chains. He will work, sweat,
as black naked branches arc and tangle, black birds call, breath fogs
and freezes, his skin is dry. The ground will
swallow wood and nails, chew it up, grind it to
dust, and the grass will grow and die above it. Two dollars
to be sent to the gravedigger, who perhaps
between shovelfuls wonders
who will sleep here. Who feels between aching shoulders
the thousand widow's hearts, the holes he has yet to make, all
filled, every one. Pay the gravedigger, quick,
before he shakes the dirt from his hands.

    report violation
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Latest Comments

  • 12 years ago

    by Yakari Gabriel

    And then sybs doesthis thing
    where she paints the scenery so vivid in your mind
    you feel as if you were standing there next
    to someone,telling them this.
    unaware that it sound's like a poem

    You two are standing there,
    Seeing the man dig a grave.
    and you're talking and someone
    wrote everything you said and
    it turned into this.

    grr, how did I miss this before.

    I am sick and tired of how good you are
    okay.

    no joke baby, joke...

    such a creepy little write I love it.

  • 12 years ago

    by Tara Kay

    :O I am positively speechless Sibs...
    How dark and eerie, what a thought to have, and what a way to express it...
    The process of a gravedigger's thoughts...just WOW...

    I often wonder on my own burial, although I'd rather be cremated because I can't bare to think of my bones rotting underground and people visiting my grave on birthdays, anniversaries...to grim a thought...
    but WOW again, speechless

  • 12 years ago

    by Jordan

    This is chilling.

    In places the punctuation makes it feel like a mantra. Something that is chanted under the breaths of people who lurk near graveyards.

    So many good ideas here, wrapped into one. I like your extensive description of the process, early in the poem.

    "The ground will
    swallow wood and nails, chew it up, grind it to
    dust, and the grass will grow and die above it."

    I have never thought about burial in this sense. You made it seem even more grim than I thought previously.

    The ending was phenomenal. Wrapping up the poem by bringing to light the thoughts and feelings of the gravedigger.

    A very enjoyable to read, especially with all of he unanswered questions at the end! Definitely a great piece of horror poetry. :)

    Now I wonder...where do we go after the ground swallows us whole?

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