To Scatter Where
across the car park carrying the ashes,
the trees bereft
the birds have left
only the heft
of recorded church bells
unnatural chiming
to scatter where?
Does it matter?
a galaxy away the star whorls
in the vortex of a black hole
& light is no more
& time buckles
in the event
horizon
& what matter disappears
from the universe
when a cosmos collapses,
it overwhelms.
Roll away the stone,
the writhing things found beneath
think of me not
but I of them
make something
the universe breathes
on a cold oak bough
by a crematorium chimney,
that lone cardinal cheers,
his two-parted whistle chirped
to scatter where?
Here
black tarmac glistens
where the puddle ice cracks
I carried in these arms
& upon this back this black
pouch
heavy,
something remains
still
with death comes grief,
guilt-edged relief
perhaps belief.
Rob McClure‘s poetry has appeared most recently in Poetry Scotland, New Writing Scotland, Lallans, Anthropocene, Neologism Poetry Journal and Light. He is the author of The Violence (Queen’s Ferry Press, 2018) and The Scotsman (Black Springs Press,2024). Originally from Scotland, he teaches at Knox College in Galesburg, Illinois.
Amethyst Review 