Listen, listen to the trees!  How they natter solemnly and sometimes giggle as they pass down the stories of the ages…if only you have ears. Long branches, stretching to the heavenly skies, with abundant lush green leaves whispering and swaying to music only they can hear, all supported by solid tree trunks, rooted into the intricate, deep earth, supplying, providing, sustaining life.

Oh… we got the goods on the Two Footed buried beneath us….like Russian Hackers, we know it all and one day we’ll share…the who, what, when and where.…but we are still not sure about the why!

And that ‘Whoever has the gold, makes the rules’ …forget-about-it…not in the cemetery! Here all men and women are equal...under the ground….

Right here  a former Mayor and his family claim a prize plot, shaded by a big old tree with a stone erected so tall and wide, mere mortals stop to stare.  But the marble has crumbled, along with their earthly dreams and even if you squint, you can no longer read their names or dates of their birth or demise….. just that he had been a Mayor at some point in time.  Good news is the stone is so deteriorated that it probably wasn’t paid out of the Public Purse.

Over yonder you see a gravestone proudly announcing the bodies therein were born over the pond….like being born in Canada made you less, more or less….but we were good enough to put food in your belly, a roof over your head, educate your  children…but hey, we’re not bitter….just a bit hurt.

Next plot houses what is rumored to be a Godfather figure whose Holy Roman Catholic religion did not want him defiling their sin-free resting place….not like the Mob were ever fussy about the graves they buried their dead in….this will do nicely, ever if you have to spend eternity with ‘mangia cakes’ other wise know as ‘cakers’.

Now that towering headstone is home to a  family that goes back, and back and back….if you can believe them, their ancestors descended from King Henry V111 who had so many wives, anything is possible.  In any case they are rich as Midas and want to be given the respect they believe they are due…. Our’s is not to question why…..ours’s is just to do or die.

Still simple folk have to be buried too….and there is row on row of them, with their sad stories, if you look closely enough…..predeceased by children,  deaths occurring in short time spans…. every gravestone tells a story and we mourn them all.

But we never tell…well, except each other, the tears we see shed, the family fights at the graveside….even happy reunions sometimes…we just draw up our chair, make ourselves comfortable and listen…trying to somehow lessen the pain, diffuse the tension, help the mourners move past the moment, with the white noise rustling leaves whispering condolences…because:

They lived…They laughed…Saw sunsets glow…Loved and were loved….                      (Paraphrase John McCrae)

But we are on it…We take  the rich, the poor, the huddled masses, all yearning to be free…at last! Your moneys worth nothing when your last breath’s spent….