For Weeks After the Funeral
The house felt like the opera,
the audience in their seats, hushed, ready,
but the cast not yet arrived.
And if I said anything
to try to appease the anxious air, my words
would hang alone like the single chandelier
waiting to dim the auditorium, but still
too huge, too prominent, too bright, its light
announcing only itself, bringing more
emptiness into the emptiness.
Copyright Credit: Copyright © 2006 by Andrea Hollander Budy. First published in Five Points and included in her book, Woman in the Painting. Reprinted by permission of the author and Autumn House Press.
Source: Woman in the Painting (Autumn House Press, 2006)