Requiem

by Scott Slemmons

One:

Hang up the phone

Be silent

Stare at the air

Stare at the walls

Look into the mirror

Look away quickly

See an old packet of photographs

Reach toward them

Touch them

Draw back

Do not look at the photos

Look at anything but the photos

Look at the floor

Look at the ceiling

Look hard at the ceiling

Watch the ceiling blur

Blink

Blink faster

Watch the ceiling blur

Whisper "No"

Whisper it again

Stare

Be silent

Two:

The news hits like venom into the heart

ice into the veins

The end of my world has arrived

on the solemn, black-garbed wings

of the briefest of phone calls

The news stands before me now

silent as the harvester himself

face averted from my horror

My last symbol of human love & goodness

has been destroyed

My hope & faith have deserted me

She is dead.

Three:

I will pray

I will pray first for her soul

that she has passed the unknown tests

that she now brightens the stars above

I know that to be true

I will accept no other possibility

I will pray first for her soul

but then I shall rant & accuse

I shall demand answers of the sky

I shall cry for justice and shriek for fear

I shall bellow for resignations

I shall blaspheme

& then I will beg for relief

for release

for death

When there is nothing left to pray for

I will pray for death

Please do not fail me this time

Four:

I reel through a few pointless days

Work cannot distract

Sleep is no escape

for I dream

Bourbon amplifies the dreams

to the point of pain

For the first time ever

blues cannot help

The greatest musicians come close to the truth

but they fall short

I spend my spare time

screaming rage at bare walls

wailing like a lost baby

slamming my fists into doors, walls, tables

floors, desks, pillows

I play with matches

I play with knives

The walls continue to interest my vision

Food? I'm not hungry

Everything is empty

Five:

At last, I touch the photos

old photos

but new as yesterday

Photographs snapped by my happy, drunken hand

Forgotten friends cavort again

raise mugs in tribute

make good-naturedly obscene gestures to the camera

She is among those photographed that night

Her grinning face stares unseeingly into mine

from a half-dozen pictures

Smiling with the happiness of being surrounded by friends

of being loved

Her joyful green eyes never dreaming her fate

And all the while, my rickety little camera,

so rarely competent,

expertly sliced away posed moments of time

for tearful perusal years later

Tousled blond hair

the sultry, optimistic eyes

the nonstop electric smile

Six:

I greeted the first big storm of the season

I stood on the front porch

a glass of bourbon in one hand

& watched the thick black clouds roll in

bellies flashing with lightning

thunder whispering hoarsely on the distant wind

ozone swirling in the air

I was there for the first icy drop of water

for the downpour

for the full shrieking fury of the storm

I accepted the storm's rage

I welcomed the sizzling bolts & deafening blasts

I let the rain soak me

& fill my emptied glass

I was gone the next day

Seven:

Quest for the Grail:

After twelve hours of driving

I am on a narrow road in New Mexico

The dull asphalt is cracked & pitted

scorched by decades of sun & wind

Altitude is slowly rising

Brush is growing thicker

The rough scrub has sprouted into squat round bushes

& then into tired, stunted trees

Yucca crawls across the scenery

The sky stretches from horizon to horizon

Every cassette I brought along

has been overplayed

so I listen to the mindless static of my radio

to the constant drone of my punished engine

I listen to the miles blow by at 60 mph

I listen for a hint of meaning

Eight:

At a small convenience store outside Santa Rosa

I stop to buy gas

check the oil

grab a soda

I buy a new cassette

to relieve the wearying silence of my car

I pay a fat old woman with a crooked smile

She asks where I am going

Before I can answer, she says,

"Going to visit her grave, are you?"

After I escape to my car

I play my new Steppenwolf tape

As the opening chord of

"Cradle of Love" blasts from my speakers

I drive down the road

Nine:

Thirty miles later

I pull off the road

to stare at a metropolis

which has sprung up next to the highway

The primitive houses & towers shine

with yellow light

reflected in the sun

The streets bustle with parade-goers

thronging to behold a vision

The sign says "Welcome to Tontoneac"

I crawl through the barbed-wire fence

walk past the bored cattle

& enter the city

The racket of the cheering crowds is incredible

I stop a young Indian

with raven hair down to his waist

He wears blue jeans

cowboy boots

a Grateful Dead T-shirt

"What is this place?" I ask him

He laughs and shouts

"You've found Tontoneac, white man!"

"The largest & greatest of

the Seven Golden Cities of Cibola!"

He runs down the street

past a group of conquistadores giving

directions to a vanload of elderly Floridians

I join the crush

peering over heads

"What's going on?" I ask

"What's the big deal?"

No one answers

They stare ahead

Ten:

I see the old woman from the convenience store

She's leaning out of one of the high windows

yelling & drinking a beer

A small boy sits on the ledge above her

I have not seen him since grade school

I run into two black men

One is dressed like a hippie

He has a shaggy afro & mustache

The second has short hair

& wears an old brown suit & fedora

Both carry guitars

They greet me warmly

I begin to ask my questions

but they shout & point

I turn

& it is her

floating over the cheering crowd

blessing the millions

smiling with the happiness of being surrounded by friends

of being loved

Eternal

Her every pore was sunlight

I stare up goggle-eyed

as she slowly drifts over

She looks down at me & waves

I wave back

and then

She disappears with Tontoneac

After a minute, I walk back

past the nonchalant cows

through the barbed-wire fence

I get back in my car

& resume my pilgrimage

Eleven:

Eventually

I make my arrival

I park the car outside the gates

& walk slowly through the cemetery

past Smiths & Joneses

past Van der Meeres & Rockefellers

past the fenced graves of infants

the stately crypts of wealthy families

the unmarked plots of beggars

Her place lies apart from the rest

The dirt of her grave is still bare of grass

Her stone is simple

just her name

her birthday

& her last day

The grave is littered

with flowers & ribbons

cards & a rag doll

photographs & diamond rings

I lay my roses

(long-stemmed, red)

on the grave

& stand back to watch

Time passes

"Are you there?" I ask

I get no answer

I let time pass again

"Can you hear me?" I ask

No answer

I touch her name

letter by letter

I peer into the clouding sky

I drop to my knees

touch the dirt

dig my fingers in

I cry hard

I cry like I haven't cried since I was a baby

A few small raindrops fall on her grave

"I love you" I shout into the dirt

"I love you"

There is no answer

Time passes

heartbeats like millennia

I rise

I cannot brush the dirt from my fingers

I walk back through the cemetery

past Washingtons & Lincolns

past Changs & Ybarras

I get in the car

I drive away

Twelve:

Let the musicians play

Let them all play together

Let them perform a requiem to shame death

Give Mozart & Zappa free rein

Bring Robert Johnson & B.B. King together

Let Hank & Patsy co-exist

with Jimi & Stevie Ray

Guns N'Roses & the Doors will perform the prelude

Muddy Waters & Melissa Ethridge will play with Rundgren & Clapton

Marvin Gaye & Elton John will follow

Metallica will play the new Beethoven-Vicious-Lennon collaboration

Freddie Mercury will sing with Led Zeppellin

Tribal drums will join with humbled philharmonics

The Navajo & Apache will dance together

Garage bands, gospel choirs & legends will unite to mourn

Zeus, Jehovah & Loki will sing back-up

while Coyote howls a mourning dirge with the Wolf

Ice-T & the Who

Latifah & Aretha

U2 & Chuck Berry

ZZ Top & the Crickets

Let everyone play

Violin with harmonica

Guitar with lute

Synthesizer with tuba

Gothic organ over it all

Rappers & screechers together

Let a billion bands play through all time

They can shake the earth

raise the thunder

rip the sky

The closing jam session can shatter the stars, if they want

but I will not care

I will not listen

I will not laugh

She is dead

but I live on

Thirteen:

The years will ripen into decades

& from there to centuries

Grass will grow on the earthen mound

The presents at the tombstone

will diminish

& disappear

The marble stone will age & crack

Her mourners will join her in death

They will acquire mourners of their own

Each passing generation will

tell less of her story

until her name is no more than

a notation in ancient records

& a decaying stamp on a gravestone

And in time

records can rot

stone can crumble

She will be forgotten

That cycle can never change

© 2000 by Scott Slemmons

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