Raw winds blow. Rusted lock bars entrance to dark, dank family crypt. Souls long forgotten. Generations ceased their lineage, lost in the dust of time. Undisturbed cobwebs ensnare no prey. Nothing lives here.
Steps away, a young mother’s tears salt the ground below open-toed shoes. Her gaze locks on the small white coffin. Follows it lower, lower, and lower still, until its sides are nestled by mother earth. Stunned mourners file by, gently releasing miniature white roses into fresh dug grave. Wind shifts. Breeze rifles through nearby trees. Magnolia blossoms, rift from spring green leaves, rain quietly on forlorn scene.
Rest little one, love shall follow you. Mother, father, sisters too. All will come in time. And more. And more. Until the dust of time consumes them all.
Used for Napowrimo day 28 where the prompt was to write prose poetry. Photo taken several months ago at the cemetery in Valparaiso, Chile. Shared with dVerse, the virtual pub for poets, on Thursday, May 3rds OLN.
lillian the home poet 
chilling…and tragic.
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Sad …beautifully penned.
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superb
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So nice to see your comment this morning.
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it was my pleasure – I spend so much time reading, I find precious little time for commenting
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Brava.. 🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀
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This is wonderful, such a sadness in those little coffins.. and you can go into any cemetery and find a grave like this and imagine how it felt like
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So sad, Lill. Does teh sun ever shine at a tragic funeral/ It seems to me there are always raw winds – I love the shift in your poem, when the ‘Breeze rifles through nearby trees. Magnolia blossoms, rift from spring green leaves, rain quietly on forlorn scene’. Your description of the crypt reminds me of the ones at Highgate Cemertey.
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“Magnolia blossoms, rift from spring green leaves, rain quietly on forlorn scene.” This is such an incredibly wistful write, Lillian.
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Deeply deeply sad Lil, but so eloquently painted.
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A lovely tribute to this little one. A reminder of our mortality.
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Enchanting. Your photo along with your prose paints a vivid scene of mourning. What is most lingering is the fact of life and death of Mother Earth and dust comforting and consuming us in the end.
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Beautifully written – melancholy infuses your poem!
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Quite stirring, the Magnolia blossoms are starting here now.
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The loss is intense and unfortunately the dust of time will consume all.
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I completely identify. I have lost two. A beautiful write
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I love the feeling that exudes from this one… So sad… so deep…so in touch with reality! Well done Lillian!
Dwight
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So sad, but lovely. The graves of children–and mothers who died in childbirth–are the graves that affect me the most when I wander through cemeteries.
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The tiny coffin, so sad. “It ain’t supposed to be that way,” I think, from a song by Willie Nelson.
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