In Still Waters

I saw the letters lying dead in still waters, 

Beneath the smothering Louisiana sun.

A man came to bury the living.

In the bayou,

All the silence and cicadas howl 

And memories come to die,

He watched as black ink began its slow descent into a great erase

Drenched in July heat, 

He sat for a long while 

After all, this isn’t a river - 

Where you can scream all the loss 

and watch it vanish

Quicky, suddenly. 

This isn’t an ocean - 

Where all heavy things sink 

and evaporate into darkness

Rapidly, never to rise again.

No, this is a bayou 

The waters here are still. 

Alive.

Haunting.

Everything that’s hurled and tossed 

is swallowed by hidden, hovering creatures - 

Reluctantly. 

In time 

The letters, and everything they once held, 

will drift toward the mysterious, dark waters below - 

reflected in the cypress trees and Spanish moss. 

In time

The ghostly nature of the Louisiana waters will be graced by sunlight, 

and all the sorrow found inside will be gone. 

In time, in still waters, 

 All the unseen things go to rest. 

A solemn ceremony 

In the bayou. 

In the still waters