Embalming Grey

The idea of stuffing her into a box was unnerving.
The pink coffin mocked my ache.
Coffin was such a strange word to use then.
It's such a strange word to use now.
I was terrified to approach her corpse.
What if she had grown fangs in death?
How would the newspapers describe the massacre
if she suddenly pulled herself from her casket
and dined upon each carotid artery in the room?
I wanted to tear that room apart.
The white walls designed to bring solace only delivered
the absence of my grandmother's life.
Just three days prior they announced the finality
of my grandfather's death.
It was no surprise she didn't wait long
to bridge the gap death wedged between them.
That didn't make it hurt any less, though.
And it didn't take away my responsibility
to become a mother to the born again child my own
mother had become.
Grief is such an anguishing process that,
if left incomplet, digs into your heart and takes
permanent residence.
My own heart has been harboring it
for years.

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