The Dead Still Walk

Revere the dead they say, 

Those who have passed beyond the veil, 

Of lasting eternity, 

Or into the blackness of death’s maw. 

But what of those left behind?

Lifeless shells, peeling and scarred, 

Buffeted by the winds of change, 

Clinging to conviction, slowly waning. 

The dead do not feel the piercing cut, 

Of rejection’s jagged edge, 

Nor the weight of loneliness, 

Insidiously suffocating its victims.

They are comforted by the warm weight, 

Of Earth’s embrace, 

A womb of soil, a bosom of leaves, 

Cocooning their rigid remains. 

Nestled in the safety of death’s arms, 

They sleep away the passing centuries, 

Blissfully unaware, 

Dreaming in a cloud of auburn and gold. 

While the living chase forgotten legacies, 

Dreams shattered, a mosaic of broken glass, 

Seeping crimson, the blood of agony, 

Dripping from their tattered fingers. 

Their stories wait patiently,

On pages yet unwritten, invisible, 

Hidden in the mossy crack between worlds, 

Waiting for their boundless slumber. 

By Audra Burwell