Stillborn

Poetry Dr. Rodney Sharkey

He told me one night about that day. He walked behind She walked before Skeletal in her night gown Both Bereft They never spoke of it again They had lost a child stillborn the hospital kept the corpse and mother left every possession in the ward. “Out” she cried and Silently across the car park my father carried the empty suitcase to his grave.

We are all sons and daughters of ghost fathers brothers and sisters of ghost siblings These who stretch their limbs across time teaching us how to love those that remain. Yet whether they beat or broke loved or mended hearts strive to feel alive when culled in pain.

So for a moment in a poem now let striving stop.

For in the end as at her beginning all will pass and spirit us away think us into light follow us out of time crying all the while in beauty in melancholic beauty, for the dead are all beautiful and still born.