Easter Sunday

They say

the living-dead are zombies;

some say

Jesus Christ is a zombie

because he rose

 from the dead living.

Just one Sunday afternoon

like everyone else –

always sunny

with picturesque skies.

My father once owned a convertible

and on these sun days

would ask me and my siblings

if we’d like to take a ride.

I always went,

clamouring for the front seat

to stretch out my legs

next to my father,

to smell him light a fresh

cigarette in the wishing wind,

watch the white lines

dash by,

listen to the road scream

under rubber tires,

blinded by birds flying

into the blaring sun,

and wonder why

my father would drive

staring ahead, straight down the road

in silence

whenever not answering us kids

with discipline or fiction or fact,

since every word was a question.

What was it

that made my father,

want to drive with no purpose

in mind

than to drive, stare at grey

for longer than any of his children

could bare, bored at the passing

tress and passing cars

passing time.

They say

the stone rolled away

and the zombie stepped out in glory

three days festering in cloth

and perfume, like a mummy

dressed for the ball.

I heard

a soldier died,

maybe two.

As time passed,

my father

 lost the convertible

and we the dogwood trees

in the front yard,

the ones next to the driveway

that bloomed every spring.

We hid Easter eggs in those branches,

blooming limbs grasping yoke,

adorned in dye and anticipation,

would pass by them

on my father’s joy rides.

Just one Sunday afternoon,

like all the rest,

always skies and suns and winds,

maybe clouds, maybe rains,

maybe lost among the questions

become answers,

lost while driving, staring

at what’s left of the world ahead

with no purpose in mind.