As anyone with deceased parents knows,
death is as slipshod as departing snows.
There are bills to be paid and bangles moved,
paintings appraised and taxes approved,
rugs to be shaken and silverware racked,
attics emptied and fine china packed,
as each generation’s forced to contest
with the mess that the previous one's left.
Now, we’re not talking here of pollution
or the fallout from bloody revolution,
but of the remains lodged in the bones
after the dust is cleared from our homes ...
and what we’ll pass to a daughter or son
when our own cluttered day on Earth is done.