Assessing the Dead
       

When Gettysburg's dead, years buried,
were unearthed for removal
to national cemeteries,
someone was hired to separate
Union from Confederate.
Relying, at first, upon
jacket color, he made certain
the loyal were rewarded.

My sister, twice, has studied
photographs to perfect display,
learning which necklace our mother
wore with her blue, Sunday-only
lace-trimmed dress, how, exactly,
our father's awards were arranged
for ceremony when he put on
his scoutmasters uniform,
placing those reframed portraits
alongside both coffins like
mirrors or proof of love.

For the difficult cases,
uniform color unknown,
the grave-shifter was taught
to recognize the brand names
of shoes and the quality
of underwear to mark bones
qualified for respected graves.

And now we've learned elephants
investigate the bones of their dead
by smell and touch, using the tips
of their trunks to caress what's left.
And yes, sometimes the young can
identify their parents,
lingering longer to inspect,
or, we like to imagine,
reflect. And whether saddened
or comforted by the ordeal
of recollection they examine
the contours of the whitened skull.
Which is how reverie begins.
Then how it ends in turning away,
the necessary going on.

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Copyright © 2020 Gary Fincke All rights reserved
from The Infinity Room
Wheelbarrow Books
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission