These three poems from the Stone Circle archive examine interactions with the dead — the dead sit at the table with us again, the dead don’t know anything, the dead sometimes only understand music.
How Can You Have Any Pudding…
by Susan Grimm
The dead crowd the table thickly, criticize our meat. They give
off a low dark buzz. Floating like stodgy balloons, they wobble-
perch on their usual chairs.
The Dead Will Never Know
by Mary Christine Delea
Eager to unmask what we believe are their attempts
at communication, we are left back where we started.
Without them.
Day of the Dead
by Sam Szanto
The babies know us only by our heart
beats. My child is handed to me.
I press my face to hers and rock,
skin to skin, cradling and crying
and kissing and crooning.
Don’t stop there…
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