The Grief House

by Linda Hutsell-Manning

 he was, she heard them say, a cat
 a death so small against this aching world
 a flicker snuffed between
 the evening news and morning toast
 a sentimental sadness lost in idle talk
 she would, she heard them say, survive

she slips into the grief house numb and unprepared
his cat silk energy spills ice cold on her face
his whiskered breath sifts through her fingers
drifts between the on-location clips of children
mute from war scars, pain that fills
the landscape with its sharp metallic stench

 death brought to you 
 on late night NBC
 with severed body parts
 and blood washed clean by Tide

she strokes his now still coat, deceptive
resting just asleep fades to a room's electric glare
her mother's thin dementia-ridden bones
the last slow, slack-jawed sigh dissolves into
a child-like frame left on the bed
a lone white glove forgotten in the haste to leave

 death caught in forms and 
 bank accounts and cards
 all rendered ash and stored
 in tasteful plastic oak

she carries him through grass and leaf, the grave's black
earth, the shovel solid in the fading light
her tears fall into graves where women weak from birth
place stones as sentinels against the howling night
their hope pulled down against the homestead wind
their courage scattered on the stubbled fields

 death wooed by distance
 dried-up wells and flies
 the kitchen table cleared
 for grief and Sunday prayers

she lays down stones and shovels dirt, her senses
memories slipping back, his touch and sound almost
transparent now as darkness settles into earth,
only those last few seconds, sharp-edged, play again
again that energy, so real, the next warm breath
its exit into steel-jawed silence, swift and unannounced

 he was, she heard them say, a cat
 a death so small against this aching world
 a flicker lost between
 the headlight's glare and tire's thud
 an echo of all endings cold and still, and yet
 she would, she heard them say, survive

Linda Hutsell-Manning was born in Winnipeg, Manitoba in 1940. Attended school in Manitoba and Ontario, graduated from Toronto Teachers College, taught in a Southern Ontario one room school. BA from University of Guelph in 1975; first published in 1981. Author of seven children's books/plays, TVOntario scripts, short fiction/ poetry in Canadian literary magazines and anthologies. Gives readings/workshops across Canada and in 1998, in Coburg, Germany and Luxembourg. Currently organizes and hosts monthly author readings at Java Man Cafe, Cobourg, ON. Recently completed time travel novel, The Magic Bugle and poetry collection, Our Whole Lives Waiting Now working on adult novel That Summer in Franklin. Lives in Cobourg with husband, James. Has three grown children and three grandchildren.