Demeter called me
as I was working
a graveside shovel.

My blisters
were bleeding and full
of sand and salt and lime
as we gathered
around the big hole
to send another cold soul home.

I didn’t answer.
I kept working the earth,
as such a conscious pause
and blasphemous interruption
would surely foster negative karma
for all the warm souls still standing
in the cemetery yard
praying into an open hole.

The phone went quiet.

She called again.

Still, I did not answer.

I drove the blade
into the mound of earth
next to the aspiring grave,
standing the shovel straight up,
searching for a corner
of some forgotten zenith.

I studied the shadow of the handle
as it fell off the blistered wood
and onto the ground below.

The phone continued ringing,
and the dirt kept going back,
but answers never came.

# # #

James Redfern was born and raised in Long Beach, California. Redfern is a graduate of Grinnell College. His work has been published by Whizdome Press, Great Lakes Poetry Press, Fear and Loathing in Long Beach, and elsewhere. He is the author of several novels (most recently HECATOMB) and several volumes of poetry (most recently Catfish in a Bowl Redux).

Photo: Paolo Chiabrando