Sometimes the Dead
by BABO KAMEL
*
My mother is always alive when I dream of her.
In her downtown clothes the silk scarf floats
on her shoulder, she waves her white gloves.
*
On the hill above the cemetery, the empty wooden swing
sweeps back and forth as if a young girl still rides
its perfect arc above the graves.
*
In the subterranean station it is night in either direction.
Voices of the dead call to each other across the tracks,
as if each were a name they could return to.
*
Sometimes the dead cover the mirrors
with their own faces
so when I look at myself
it’s my mother’s features I see--
the way I remember her
in the clamp and startle of letting go.
*
The dead mourn
for themselves from the dark terminals
their eyes are becoming, all night it’s an orgy
of elegy and I toss and sweat
under the tea-rosed sheets
like a weed in my own bed
as if I didn’t belong there
as if the dead were entitled
to as much room as they need.