Life's Bitter Pill

The preacher's eyes looked so sad as we walked from the graveyard. They had just buried my mother who died at fifty one. The mourners were on their way picking pebbles from the ground, casting them into mother's grave, they too had tears in their eyes. He placed his hand over my shoulder as he spoke with those misty eyes: "Take it easy, son, don’t you cry, your mother must be in heaven now." But I was numb and unbelieving with no thoughts to what he'd said for I could never forgive his God for taking mother away from me. My poor father silently cried, shocked by the death of his wife. But he never knew, if only he knew that he was soon going to die too. I looked around me with mock relief and I saw them all clothed in black. "Take it easy, brothers and sisters, no need crying over spilled milk." I don't know how many times I cried, people had tried to hurt my pride; never caring to look into my feelings, they laughed at me behind my back. Now my dreams had all burned down, fate had stolen my golden crown; while the curtain's blown by the wind the rain was dripping from the pane. I'd been through life's ups and downs but I never moaned aloud like a clown. ‘Take it easy, Fred, take it easy, soon the dark clouds will go away.’