Saturday Morning Walk |
| by Rachel Osborne |
I step carefully on the gravel path, trying to make my footfalls
quiet as not to disturb anyone.
I smile to myself.
I am alone.
Nevertheless, I try to step softly, because I realize there are hundreds
of people that surround me,
watching in silence.
There are places I tend to be silent instinctively
once I cross the threshold:
libraries, art galleries, cemeteries.
Perhaps it is because they are the mortal remnants of men,
the only thing left, vainly trying to live in the dead man's stead.
In respect, I fall silent and try to listen to these voices from the dust.
These weathered stone lips have been mouthing
the same words for generations.
This mouth is beginning to close,
never to speak again,
battered into eternal silence by rain, moss and vandals.
But with what voice do the dead who never had an epitaph
or whose stone has been destroyed speak?
They speak in one massive stone chorus in the center of the cemetery and
sing with bells and see with stained glass eyes.
The parish church of Kea has been standing,
it's squatty square tower straining towards heaven,
for many hundreds of years.
I lean against its cold stone.
I wonder what tumult this small plot of land
will know when the angel blows his trump.
Softly, I begin to hear music from above.
I crane my neck as it increases in volume.
From the open window, I realize that I am privy
to someone's weekly organ practice.
I stand and listen to those complicated,
unfamiliar hymns for a long while,
the sole living member of an audience of thousands.
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