By a Grave

[tomsdisch]

It's been only a year since I died
in a Manhattan hsopital bed
but already it seems a World War ago,
like the ads in some vintage copy of Life.
The same thing must have happened
to you: in an old address book
you come upon a name and wonder who
that would have been. A friend? A plumber
someone recommended? Not a clue.
The Greeks would pour libations of wine
(because it's the color of blood, or because
it does awaken memories?) on a grave
to rouse the soul supposedly asleep
within. Someone must stir my dust
from time to time. Perhaps it's Tom
in a mood of drunken reproach
calling someone who hasn't called him
to remind them of imagined perfidies.
And *their* names drift through the hazed hall
like wisps of smoke. And I wonder
who *was* Gregory Sandler. Or Annie. Did I know
an Annie once. And then I return to my death.

--Tom Disch