I love to walk through cemeteries
reading all the stones.

Not the names so much
as the stories that are told.

I really like the old ones
where the live oaks grow.

And the dead lie in shaded
gardens planted all in rows.

Marble angels look towards heaven,
with weathered wings and robes.

stone cherubs represent nameless babies
from a hundred years ago.

Fine cut pillars of the hardest stone,
mark graves of rich men who died alone.

and in the farthest corners
the small cement stones.

barely readable names
of people no one knows.

But the soil is no worse
here than it is over there.

And the angel in the center
just pretends to cry.

Honestly, she doesn't care.