DEATH Poem: Corpse Found: For My Uncle Dennis, by Erin Starr Saint Trailer Park

Corpse found,
mostly decomposed by
the time the smell
could no longer be
ignored or
disregarded with a
homely
shrug or
blamed on wild animals;

barely any skin tissue left,
nose cartilage gone,
eyeballs gone;
just two bleak holes
gaped and
horrible:
macabre raisins
dangled from
shriveled tips and
sagged stems;

gone the
gooey intricate
biological machines
inexplicably
driven to operate
the organism’s ability
to perceive surrounding space
and matter,

or make faces like
“Surprise!” on your
grandsons third birthday

or give a
stone cold,
hardened stare
(Inspired by Clint Eastwood, no doubt),
gripped drumsticks in hand
and a mullet (unironically)
anointed with the blue
dollar tree
bandana and
arms bulged
out of a sleeveless
denim shirt;
gone.

No eyes, just
umbrous depths of
barren holes,
spanned boundlessly over
horrific voids,
bottomless pits,
and
volcanic blood spewed
and vomited out of
repulsive hollows;

characteristics of a
decomposed corpse in a
‘95 Honda;

just tired
parts rotted and
decayed
in a junkyard in
Idaho;

a bloated miasma,
silent as a rock,
emitted cobalt, ocherous and
putrescent green
mists, that
obscured the windows;
they towed it
not
knowing that inside,

my Uncle
Dennis,
youngest child of
nine, wasn’t finished
decaying

Just another
greedy mouth and
innards destined to
pang with hunger;

Uncle Dennis
survived the
stomach punches and
turpentine his father forced
down
her throat to
stop the thing from
being born;

“a convict, junkie,
and
unruly
drug addict”

they muttered as they cast
their eyes
downward at the
metal table
where we drank
Michelob Ultra,

my aunts despondent
eyes,
swollen and hostile holding
back tears
that she
refused to let flow.

No tears
for

the drug addict.
The thief. Loser. Dope user
and a wasted life,

drove up a mountain road on
a late spring Idaho day
and found a
quiet spot; surrounded by
tall Western whites, subalpine firs and
towering ponderosas,

in the pines
a branch fluttered and he
looked up to see
a song sparrow hop
for
a fleeting moment,
and then he saw nothing
after that