From the Grave

I was doing some cleaning and found these old poems. Here is one of them-

From the Grave

The feel of death has touched me

However slight it may have been

It crept in ever so slowly

Trying to fill as much space as it can

I felt its dread and darkness

Its weight and ever searching loneliness

I felt its urgent need

My soul it must caress

I tried to shut it out

But none- the- less it stayed

Farther in it crept

From its path it never swayed

Until it filled my entire being

My body and my soul

Then it left so swiftly

What could have been its goal?

*Note: Written February 6, 1983 Dedicated to Harry A. Bradford. I awoke from a dream screaming. As occurs I knew it was one of those dreams. The dream was me trapped under the house trailer that we lived in. The space was small and tight. I didn’t like it. I felt claustrophobic. Then I looked around in the dark and noticed that underneath me were lots of bodies, dead bodies. I remember thinking “There is some sort of mistake. I do not belong here.” I started to scream and I smelled this thick carnation smell. It made me want to puke it was so strong.

That day I was a wreck worried about my family. Were they in danger? How could I save them? What was I supposed to save them from?

While on my way to work the next day I started to smell that sickly sweet carnation smell. I wanted to vomit. I was so nauseous. The more I drove the sicker I felt and that smell was so intense. Ahead of me I saw a vehicle with its lights on come around a bend in the road. This was before running with your lights on was recommended. There were many cars behind it with their lights on as well. It was a funeral. The smell intensified and I almost threw up.

I drove on allowing the funeral to pass. I knew where it was heading. There was a cemetery on my way to work. After the caravan passed, the smell drifted away. I still felt sick but I think it was mostly from the shock of the event and the strength of the smell.

After work I went to the cemetery and found the grave. It was close to my fathers, a newer section of the cemetery. That night I took a white carnation from the grave. It had that very same smelled that made me ill during the dream and earlier that day when the hearse came around the bend.

The next day I went back and inquired from the grounds keeper who the was buried the day before. The man said it was the preacher. I later found the obituary for Harry A. Bradford.

This event stuck with me for a very long time. 

For this printing I tried to look up the obit for Harry. It turns out that he was born on September 15, 1930, he was 52 years old. I was born in September on the 18th. Just an eerie coincidence. I did an online search to find his obituary but was not successful. I will keep looking. I did find his date of birth and death, his age at death. And his social security number. That should not be accessible. Just saying. 

http://www.faqs.org/people-search/harry-bradford/#b this is where I found his information.