.......

I don't know.
I think I do,
But...
I still don't know.. (for sure)
....

(This is a memory from my childhood. )
He's not dead, I know he's not.
See. I can see his chest. Rising and falling.
Rising and falling.
Stop staring at me and stop asking me
Why I'm not crying.
Why should I cry?
Why are all these people here anyway,
and why are they all dressed up today.
And why's mama just sitting there
not ever moving or anything, just staring
out across the fields.
What's wrong with her.
They didn't listen to me. I couldn't make
them hear me with my silent pleading
they put him in that pine box lined with
white satin cloth on the inside and
covered on the outside with some kind
of heavy black cloth.
But why. He was not dead.
I saw him breatheing.
His chest was rising and falling.
Rising and falling.
I wouldn't go look again. It took a long
dusty trip on the back of that flatbed truck
Hauling him off
To the little brown church at last
To cry and sing sad songs downcast
Everybody hugging.
But not me. I would not take a part
In throwing clods of dirt into that hole
Onto that box covered in black cloth
Where my poor little heart could not see
Nothing but my daddy being taken from me.
Not dead.
No..