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Last Act
[A second burial late in August. One, in June]
black dregs of coffee we keep stirring at the bottom of our cups
our eyes cast down and iron-hard
in total silence
filled with silences' mute plaints
drenched in their wells
after we've kneeled each on our turn beside the wreath-clad headstone face
reading the gilded-lettered greetings on our ribbons to the dead
all of us trying though I doubt that anyone of us produced a voice more firm than that defensive, wretched, bitterly fraught wail which could be heard as a faint sough but didn't carry spoken words
that be distinct
to living ears
out to the group of ten or twelve of us assembled around the grave
and no wind died out in the treetops on this brilliantly calm day that could have -first- buried our speeches in the rustling of the leaves and then, on dropping, let our voices stand out strangely audible against the peace that's settled - sudden - early autumn - over nature
(like the movies, like that idiot always telling you the plot and then the scene cuts from loud action to a peaceful landscape scene and sends his comment on what's coming rolling full blast down the rows)
it would have come as a relief to us, we're thinking, our heads bowed, a rush of silence primed to drive our feckless lines, sorry and tired, with unforeseen and newborn force into the niches of our hearts, our heads look up, there is a brief and floating moment of surprise and then a smile comes and caresses the hard outlines of our brows and makes us know, whether we're willing to admit it or we're not, that there's no straight and easy path leading through life, no absolute heroes except us lugging our endless -endless- sequence of mistakes, our inborn burdenful of goofs which at some point -later in life- we'll laugh about; it would have eased us to look up and be reminded of the fact, weighed down by sorrow's grief doubly we would have felt doubly relieved – only we weren't, not at this point, not at this death's stage on our trail - there was no comfort for us now, no more compassion left to spare
a second time - no dying breeze with its hushed silence in the leaves - nothing but acrid gravity - black acrid dregs we stir and stir - sunk - at the bottoms of cracked cups
how deep it touches us to see this
lame-laid figure shed his tears before an audience of guests
cameras rolling
photo flashes
water running down his cheeks
in plenteous streams
while he bites down to
-visibly- prevent his spit-licked lips from trembling
who's a master of the East Room
side of life's
solemn last act
is a master - mass producer
of correctness - fads and postures
of our days'
missions complete
cleaning his hands in tears of
4000 troops dead by then and 60.000 wounded by that time
more than one million people dead
five million orphans
seven million refugees - one million widowed
homeless, destitute and starving
that's accounted for by then
a prolonged war zone
death rates rising among people not involved
children and elderly and ill
and mother-prostitutes who sell themselves for foodstuffs
for their homes
for their survival, as a last measure of self-help for the day
who's a master - of the fashions
and correctness
East Room audience
from this nation's
media staging
and the postures
of our day
is a master
shedding tears
to cut a figure
that persuades, that will impact an audience
cameras rolling
to a crowd
of honored guests
this nation's debt owed
that can never be repaid
is a master - of corruption - of the fashions - of a debt that can't be paid - the East Room function - photo flashes - nation's ways
boy, how it touches us to witness it first hand from where we sit
retching black, bitter dregs of coffee at cracked bottoms of cracked cups
black dregs we stir and stir - black rancor - at the blackmost of our minds
we keep our eyes cast on the ground while shaking hands - biting our guts
when we take leave - before we part
our minds strung hard
all go their separate ways
wells drained
the way they came
away
in silence
Arndt Britschgi: Born and raised in Finland, Arndt Britschgi spent the best part of his life
in Madrid, Spain, and in 2006 completed his Ph.D. in Philosophy from the University of Zürich, Switzerland
- his book on Newcomb's Paradox/Free Will is available in English from Philosophia Verlag in Germany.
Besides in Ascent Aspirations, writings of his have appeared in Literary Fragments, Kulttuurivihkot
(Finnish), Southern Cross Review, the EOTU E-Zine, milk magazine, Slow Trains Literary Journal,
The Modern Review, and Feathertale.
Email: Arndt Britschgi
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