A BRIDGE OF BREATH
577
"sawdust to sawdust" and that surely what was falling was sawdust
from the planeing
mill.
All around the graveyard there was the ruin
of summer, summer's wreck and plunder. Weeds were rusty with seed .
and the zinnias were crumbling. And then all the members of the
families fell upon each other, embracing and kissing and wailing and
sharing their separate and secret tragedies ; and for a moment at the
Charity Graveyard there was a reunion of blood and a membership
of kin over your gr.ave (the odor of lilies and carnations gave me
a sensuous, exotic elation that I was ashamed of). There was a kind
of meekness and the relief felt in truce. Some took a flower from
your grave and fought others to keep it, it was like a battle of fiends
over a holy prize; and Aunty Malley came up in a trance and said
to Cousin Lottie
«What kin are we all to each other) anyway?))
But
the deaf old Mother, wise and bitter and skeptic, did not fall to the
graveyard trickery and stood off to herself, gazing at your grave.
There seemed to be some misery over in the world. Some atone–
ment, some ransom was paid for all of us, for all our Sins. Now, in
due time and in right Season, what resurrection of what spirit would
assure us of the meaning of this death, Folner?
As
we turned to go away and leave you in the graveyard, I
looked back and discovered a tall and sorrowful stranger standing
alone by a crepemyrtle tree. It seemed he wanted to say something
to me, that he was beckoning to me. But we got in our cars and
drove away and he turned and watched us 'as we went away.
