Only Sleeping

One, two, three, four–

The sharp creak of a wooden chair stops me in my tracks.

It originates from a child, shifting impatiently in his seat

Just a few rows ahead in this structured formation.

Like an audience, whose favorite team

Just lost the game of a lifetime,

Yet instead, a literal lifetime is lost,

Its sheen outer casing left out in the open

To gawk at.

Like a deer twisted up on the side of the road,

I’m capable of glancing for only a moment

Before a pit opens up in my stomach.

So much lovelier than a deer, poised and peaceful,

But sickening all the same.

Five, six, seven, eight—

A sniffle pierces my eardrums from a few seats back,

Sending a rapid shiver down my spine. The sound itself

Has a thickness to it. I can almost feel the slime dripping

Down my own throat. A sniffle here, another sniffle there,

I bet their masks are filling up with the gunk.

My mask is clean,

My cheeks are dry.

What is there to cry about?

She’s only sleeping.

Nine, ten, eleven, twelve-

I catch a whiff of the bouquet of roses that scatter Above her casket. In the way that acne speckles

The face of a young teen, the flowers burn bright red

Against the otherwise bland, cream-colored walls.

Cut at the stem, hung up for eyes to feast on

Before they wither up to nothingness.

It’s truly a lovely display.

I wish she’d wake up to see it.

Thirteen, fourteen, fifteen, sixteen-

I watch my aunt hug my uncle in the very first row

And I picture myself as a germ

Much smaller than the eye can see,

Packing my things and moving

From one arm to another.

From one chest to another. Jumping

From place to place,

From person to person,

Leaving a bit of myself behind each time.

Traveling from my mother to my father, I know

Something must be wrong. When was the last time

They wanted to hug?

Seventeen, eighteen, nineteen, twenty.

I count twenty lightbulbs installed above me and the priest

Drones on about someone named God.

Someone I haven’t met before. He says,

"God is always with us, looking down on us

To guide us somewhere better."

Looking up, I can't help but wonder if this man is in

The lights above me. In any of the twenty lightbulbs

That cast a dim glow

On the crowd of people I hardly know, yet

Shine the brightest

On the person resting

At the front of the room.

Dust must have found its way into my eye,

Or maybe yesterday’s makeup, because

My cheeks aren’t quite as dry

As they were

Before.