 |
I didn’t know my wife had a two-drink minimum.
I mean, I should have realized by now. I never remember having only one drink with her. And there we were, early in July at Blackjack Mulligan's bar in Garfield, NJ, where the waitresses wear “I love BJs” t-shirts and they serve authentic pirogies from Piast’s down the street.
I had wolfed down my portion and was ready to leave, when my wife said she would like another glass of wine. So I stared out the window at St. Peter’s Greek Catholic Cemetery, in disrepair, across the street. My friends in the NJ Poetry Circle at The Sanctuary community center in Butler provided a prompt for our writing that week: one word, "holes."
I kept thinking about the prompt. Later, I took my wife by the hand to wander in the cemetery. Still later, I wrote a poem:
Across the street from BJ’s Bar, next to Walmart,
on the Feast Day of St. Michael Moros,
the 98th anniversary of his death and entrance into Heaven,
I pass through rusted iron gates on a sweltering day in Garfield, NJ.
A sign reads, “No Dogs Allowed.”
This is St. Peter’s Cemetery, perpetually open since 1895,
where I wander among 2,600 holes in the ground,
2,600 bodies in decay, and not a single soul to be found.
I gather and dispose the litter in my path,
then brush matted grass from stone to reveal the names of the dead.
Bless me, Father, for I have sinned.
It has been 20 years since my last Confession,
the day my earthly father died.
My sin is this: I lost my faith that day.
I am here to reclaim it among the toppled crosses,
the stone angels worn with age,
the paper flowers blown into haphazard piles.
I linger along the back edges of the grounds,
bounded by the remains of the Saddle River,
with a stained and matted teddy bear on its banks,
before it empties into the Passaic.
For this and all my past sins, I am heartily sorry.
I seek forgiveness from Steven and Mary Seelagy,
a married couple in their late 80s,
who died a month apart in 1989.
I seek forgiveness from Carlos Samuel Cruz,
who died in 2012 at age 65,
“Always in Our Hearts,” but no obituary to be found.
I seek forgiveness from Fernando Gonzalez Sr.,
dead in 1999 soon after his 67th birthday.
I seek forgiveness from Jesse M. Rivera, “Saintly Scholar,”
who died in 2008 at age 18.
A guitar fretboard is impaled next to his grave;
he died in prison, a suicide.
I found Joan Zavinsky’s portrait face down on a trampled path
and returned it to where she was buried in 2001.
She lived to 85; her photo showing her forever young.
Her husband, Joseph, died in 1977. His portrait is fixed and stern.
Then there are more young: Charles Mancuso, age 19, who died in 1932,
Anna Marynak, 3 years old, who died in 1920,
neighboring 1931 graves of Marie Cupo and Anna Kulik, both 1 year old,
near the pristine stone of Michael Moros, 1 day old, July 2-July 3, 1927.
I finger another bead in the pocket of my jeans.
You don’t need to linger at each grave.
I will count the dead for you:
59 names, including generations of entire families…
11 Barnas, 9 Babyaks, 8 Balints,
6 Miskes, 5 Ditinicks,
including all 3 sons who died young,
4 Gburs and 4 Dutkeviches.
All buried here, where my father was born.
I summon these foresaken dead,
with a prayer for each soul
on the 59 raven-black beads of my father’s rosary.
I stay until I stand forgiven before the Lord.
Now I implore Michael Moros, infant saint:
“Restore my faith!
Raise my father to life for just one day,
and I will doubt God’s grace nevermore.”
