Poetry
Felix Thursday
Undertaking
We're late to the funeral parlor
to discuss my dad's cremation.
The undertaker is waiting patiently.
He glances at his watch, says nothing.
An archaic smile is embalmed on his face,
such as it took the Greeks centuries to perfect.
His body is still struggling with contrapposto.
He escorts us to a sequestered room
with black leather chairs, arranged
around an oak table where a vase sits,
stuffed with freshly-cut carnations.
It occurs to me, this room is made of death.
His voice is fine-tuned,
mechanically consoling.
The "soft-sell" technique.
But all I hear is the faux granite clock,
perched like a sentinel on the bookcase behind us.
It's wrought like a tombstone.
It doesn't even tic, just tocks.
Tock, Talk, Tock, Talk, Tock.
Each grim click subtracts
the breath from my lungs.
My mind is swaying like a pendulum,
out of time with the Light-Classical
music drifting from unseen speakers.
Next we're led to the urn room.
Dozens are on display,
like a tacky pharaoh's sarcophagus.
Mom is shaking while she tries to shop.
In her fingers are shards of Kleenex.
What does one buy for the dead?
Her words click like the clock:
"Plain?"
"With flowers?"
"Do you have any with mountain scenes?" she asks.
He stretches for one.
"Is that supposed to be Mt. Shasta?"
He stutters like the second hand of a watch unwinding.
"Looks more like Mt. Rainier," I say.
"No, maybe Mt. Vesuvius."
"Got any with Mt. Rushmore?"
He stares back at me, statue-faced.
As we leave the urn closet,
I apprehend two employees laughing.
I'm curious to know what jokes
are told at funeral parlors.
These people are cuckoos.
Outside in the parking lot, we're smoking cigarettes.
Too dazed to drive. No one saying a word.
I watch the cigarette burn down between my fingers,
and think of how my dad's body will soon turn
to ash like the tobacco.
It's noon, and a bell rings.
The streets are crawling with traffic.
Reminding us it's time to go.
