Carnations and Angels

Visiting the City of the Dead
is an odyssey of traffic lights
dissecting nondescript suburbs,
children sucking lollipops on
footpaths outside shopping malls,
churchgoers fulfilling obligations
on Autumnal Sunday,
and obscure folk singers on the
CD player in the jeep.

Springvale Road is legendary for its length,
cutting the Eastern suburbs like
a cut throat razor until the chaos
of Princes Highway messes everything up,
an ugly blotch of roads, traffic lights and cars.

Somehow Police Road is comforting even
knowing where it leads,
the bone yard
the ash grove
the vale of lost love
the farm of tears
and wilted flowers,
a parade of plaques portraying the
perfection of death,
the smiles of the lost.

Clipped lawns conceal
our despond as
carnations and angels
grace the grave.