Safe In Your Forever Dream Poem by Patti Masterman

Your grave must be your bed,
though I never thought of it that way before;
we who walk above, while you are embedded
in sandy soil and clay, snaking roots,
all the rocks and debris of land.

You're sleeping in earth just above bedrock,
over long aeons shifting slightly in your sleep,
like a dried flower invisibly redefines its contours,
the multi-colored mold encircling like a crown,
where a creeping, uneven darkness outlines you,
once heavily pressed against white satin.

All our patterings are muffled nothings down beneath;
the exclamations, cries, murmurs, whispers-
only the lawnmower capable of breaking the rigid silence,
or sometimes a distant thunder
that shudders the ground around the ones sleeping.

You lie still in your dream, locked-in,
unknowing that there was never an awakening,
or that you lie inside the sweating tomb,
or whether or not there is headstone, plate or brass urn
to mark your place in this unknown city.

And who stands above at times, or who never comes-
these are things that can never concern you, because dreams
are all you know now, softly nestled there where grief and pain,
age and regret can never reach you: safe in your forever dream.