The grass withers, the flower fades

The embalmers are merely the last

of a comprehensive list

of skilled experts and practitioners

who are employed to prompt,

poke, prod, probe, inject, abrade, cut,

suck, enhance, colour, manipulate and lie

in order to refute,

or at least delay, the mortal transience

that we acknowledge, reluctantly,

will one day find us. Such a frantic denial.

Others have resorted to constructing edifices

designed to carry their name into perpetuity;

a memorial, monument, endowment,

perhaps even the façade of a building

bearing that name chiselled in stone

and pretending that stone itself

will not one day be reduced to dust.

Superficially effective,

in truth these merely declare

that a person once lived,

but does so no longer.

Great wealth, achievement, fame

and even notoriety may carry memory

to new generations,

but, for the most, these things, too,

are fleeting and will pass.

The grass withers, the flower fades,

or so the prophet tells us;

leaving one thing that lasts forever.

This eternal word from God,

strange and elusive,

is spoken to confound, contradict, challenge,

and sometimes to annoy.

It neither withers nor fades,

and it will not go away.

© Ken Rookes 2011