No Guarantee (Poetry)

With no small ache our hearts remember them —
familiar faces — all our long-dead dears
their voices, too, from timeless conversations
those hours shared now multiplied to years

We rock with them in sleep — they lie beside us
safe again and sound and part of life
as though the clock turns back with night’s kind bounty
restoring child to mother, man to wife

All loves we’ve lost and yearn for with no ceasing
though decades pass there’s little eases pain
except those dreams where death has no dominion
sad hurts are healed and hope burns bright again

Until such time death takes and reunites us
this brief respite is everything we own
of memory as aging has us crumble
to dust and into utter darkness blown

And there to rest in peace — an end to sorrow
or so each tombstone claims with no real proof
we go to meet our maker like a lover
with no guarantee our ghosts will find the truth