"In Memoriam" by Juliette Sebock

In Memoriam

It must sound strange,
to hear me say
that I miss spending time
in cemeteries.

I can't help but think back
to walking through the gravestones
to take flowers to a relative
I never got to meet,
lay Tootsie Rolls at the feet
of a sports star killed too young,
leave pennies to rust,
leave eroded brown-tinged circles on stones.

It's been too long since I sat on a bench,
winded from running for my life,
from my life, so it naturally led me back
to death.

It's been too long since I sat among the weeds
and imagined them to be flowers,
fought the fading sky light to take
photographs, leave them on an old camera
to rot away.

Juliette Sebock

Juliette Sebock is a Best of the Net-nominated poet and writer and the author of Mistakes Were Made, Micro, How My Cat Saved My Life and Other Poems, Three Words, Plight of the Pangolin, and Boleyn, with work forthcoming or appearing in a wide variety of publications. She is the founding editor of Nightingale & Sparrow, runs a lifestyle blog, For the Sake of Good Taste, and is a regular contributor at Marías at Sampaguitas, Royal Rose, Memoir Mixtapes, and The Poetry Question. When she isn't writing (and sometimes when she is), she can be found with a cup of coffee and her cat, Fitz. Juliette can be reached on her website, juliettesebock.com, or across social media @juliettesebock.

Headshot: Deborah Sebock

Photo Credit: Staff