Nostalgia And Complaint Of The Grandparents

Les morts

C’est sous terre;

  Ça n’en sort

Guère.

  LAFORGUE

      Our diaries squatted, toad-like,

      On dark closet ledges.

      Forget-me-not and thistle

      Decalcomaned the pages.

      But where, where are they now,

        All the sad squalors

      Of those between-wars parlors?—

Cut flowers; and the sunlight spilt like soda

      On torporous rugs; the photo

      Albums all outspread ...

            The dead

Don’t get around much anymore.

      There was an hour when daughters

      Practiced arpeggios;

      Their mothers, awkward and proud,

      Would listen, smoothing their hose—

      Sundays, half-past five!

        Do you recall

      How the sun used to loll,

Lazily, just beyond the roof,

      Bloodshot and aloof?

      We thought it would never set.

        The dead don’t get

      Around much anymore.

      Eternity resembles

      One long Sunday afternoon.

      No traffic passes; the cigar smoke

      Curls in a blue cocoon.

      Children, have you nothing

        For our cold sakes?

      No tea? No little tea cakes?

Sometimes now the rains disturb

      Even our remote suburb.

      There’s a dampness underground.

      The dead don’t get around

        Much anymore.