Tuesday, March 23rd, 2021
“Sympathy for Lazarus” by Michael Coffey
He didn’t ask to be a magic trick like some dead rabbit
pulled out of a stone hat with a hocus pocus incantation
he didn’t want to be resuscitated in full decrepit stink
for his mother to see him shambling down the cemetery road
he was resting in peace after taking the dark plunge once
no one should stomach it twice, that long black falling
so Jesus, when I die and I’m put down to earthen solace
or after my ashes are scattered into entropic chaos irreversible
do not force me to go through it again like brother Lazarus
raised to face more time in suffering and second death
let your tears be so you may let me go as we all must do
grieve your best friend fully and without recourse to power
raise me then beyond time to your un-nameable dimension
where decay has died with all fear of losing myself and you
has been buried in that old entombed world where I still walk
like Lazarus already dead yet alive and yet to die and rise
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