Protestation {a Sonnet} Poem by Shane Markie

When one has left, and then another,
Till the number mounts
Into too many to remember,
I find it hard to know who counts.

My great uncle smothered in ether
On the kitchen table for a botched
Circumcision? My father
Crashing to the floor, his heart stopped?

I don't know, really, if any of it
Matters. Do you?
I've stared a couple of times into the pit.
It's just darkness, a heavy dew.

We come and go. I've been here before.
I don't want to talk about it any more.