Dreaming the Dead
       

They won't leave me alone
and come each night as if Charon
won't take them, all they owned
pawned, all their coin
already palmed by strip-mall
loan sharks.
And so they linger here
above me in the dark,
my father on the shore,
backbone still stiff
with no,
Mother a wisp, as if,
now lightened by the loss
of all her memories,
she could drift
over the dark waters.
My sister sits, shriveled
and shrouded from the crossfire
of many nights,
and my brother slumps,
all money gone
first up his nose,
then into veins.
They beckon
or bully
all night,
not from any love,
but loneliness,
even for the miscreant
who meant to save them all
and failed,
or for the happiness
that never happened,
though they still dream
of being reborn,
or at least finding
some rest
if only they can commandeer
the boat of my bed
or my bier
to ferry them finally
across.

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Copyright © 2019 William Greenway All rights reserved
from Southern Poetry Review
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission