The Final Elegy
I see your fate as my brother’s was,
as mine might have been--
actions furthered by weakness,
unworthy of notice.
That you find drama in your self-pity is unremarkable:
through a glass, refracted light makes a fine mirror;
a movie lens never focuses on the soiled sheets.
I can forgive you all but submission
that is only vanity, only exhaustion.
I’ll write you off with this pledge--
fifty dollars for the funeral fund,
these eighty words for the elegy
R. T. Castleberry
Dialogue and Appetite