Obituary

Newspaper tossed from the newspaper boy
was added to the stack, was headlines resting

on yesterday’s headlines was resting on the day
before’s. There were other stacks, other pillars

of newsprint that leaned in a house mobbed
with cats. He talked to himself yes and knew

the answers to the toughest questions yes
except the one about seeing his beloved again

who was ash inside an urn, was fine threads
of silver wound around a hairbrush. His hair

was a wind-blown cloud and his yellow nails
claws and the cats moved around the house

with the grace of smoke. The newspapers
leaned the way his body leaned over a cane

with ninety plus years piled atop his shoulders.
Yes he smoked and yes he left a cigarette

lit on the glass ashtray, but no he didn’t burn
the house down. But death anyway yes

in the hallway yes with his hand on his chest
and the other bracing against a stack yellow

and ruffled, a whole year from hardwood floor
to shoulder, twelve months of disaster sports

astrology crime and three-paneled comics.
The stack leaned then teetered then broke off

around August, the long ash of the cigarette
slumped to the coffee table. Now he knew yes

the answer about his wife and the afterlife
yes as the newspaper thumped on his lawn

and the cats turned the boas of their tails
into hooks and esses and question marks.