PALLBEARERS

PALLBEARERS

Your legs are revamping brooms

Sweeping the life out of the way

As you stride in a dancesteps of the dirge.

Your shoulders are open umbrellas

Carrying sleeping souls and dead dreams

In the parade of a last respect.

Dear pallbearer.

Does your shoulder ever ache

From carrying the heavy burden

Of a widows wails and an orphan's misery?

Does your soul ever feel sober

To the dirge meant for the men you lift

In the long procession to resting in peace?

Does it ever occur to you

That while you're just working for butter on your daily bread

The world sees you as ambassadors of death?

I salute your courage for many million reasons

To march in the midst of tears and not tear

Offering your shoulders to lift the funeral burden

While your faces become a mental image the dirge creates.

I worry about your end more than mine

For if you lead all to the grave and none is left

What feet shall walk you home when you die?

What shoulders will lift your cups in a toast?

What voice will sing your dirge?

For if you lead all to the grave and none is left

Then none will have the right to bid you farewell.

© Ifiokobong Etuk

(KING of the QUILL)