The Epitaph

‘With God in the joy and beauty of youth’:

Dead words beneath dead flowers on a tomb;

Sugar words sweet’ning your descent to doom.

And in your death there is the death of truth.

Ravaged by your youth, there was no beauty,

much less joy. And where was God to allay

the sickness of your soul? Not to betray

the dead rains down on the living, a duty

to unmask the truth of death. Red roses,

like lovers gathered by the dozen, fade

and wilt in the shadow of the nightshade,

and the skin and the womb turn to ashes.

Oh, curious mixture of wheat and chaff,

Let silence and dust be your epitaph.