Epitaph by John Grey

Sure, death' s a business.
Take a trek through a cemetery
on a Saturday afternoon.
The rich boast the big stones,
huge marble crosses,
angels with heads cocked to heaven.
The poor must get along
with paltry graves.
Some wealthy families even have
their own crypt,
solid as a vault,
door of chiseled cherub heads in oak,
a glorious sepulcher to making money.
And the poor can only cash
their flimsy paycheck
of withered flowers.
Don't believe that crap
about death being a democracy,
that comes equally to tycoon
as it does to hotel doorman.
The monuments know otherwise.
The ornaments concur.

Author bio:

John Grey is an Australian-born poet and US resident since the late seventies. He works as a financial systems analyst. Grey was recently published in Slant, Briar Cliff Review and Albatross and has work upcoming in Poem, Cider Press Review and the Evansville Review.