Seems like every cop in the state
is here.
Even some from towns over the border.
More motorbikes than at the A & W
on a Sunday afternoon.
And so many uniforms,
a wave of blue and brown.
When a poet dies,
a few of us get together,
but not every poet.
Just the ones who knew
the poor sod well.
And we don’t attend the funeral.
That’s for family,
the ones who never knew
he or she even wrote poetry.
Instead, we convene at our favorite bar,
read some of the departed’s stuff:
the excruciating pain,
the deep-rooted misery,
the betrayals, the failures,
the heart-break and the crackups.
The cop was killed on the job.
The poet, by the job.
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Funeral of a Cop
by John Grey
Bio-John Grey is an Australian poet, US resident, recently published in Stand, Washington Square Review and Rathalla Review. Latest books, “Covert” “Memory Outside The Head” and “Guest Of Myself” are available through Amazon. Work upcoming in the McNeese Review, Santa Fe Literary Review and Open Ceilings.
