Elegy

It's Christmas Eve. Mired in her melancholy, wrapped in present reveries that she alone may open, though there'll be no new surprises, only loss, and somber songs to accompany the pictures of her son; forsaken by the light she's not quite ready for exposure. Crows squawk a chorus in a leaden sky and there's a sprinkling of snow as mourners cluster black and white like so many stoic penguins round the gaping wound of earth. The box so tragically small reverberates, sealing the fate of one taken too early from the fight. Well-wishers scatter to their cars, restart their cell phones, return to Saturdays spent manicuring lawns and custom fingernails. Bereft of a daily blueprint, her aching loss too new for words to render any pleasure, still she has her novels and her neighbours, her crosswords and her cat but a pain deep in her heart for which there is no measure.