The Dead People I’ve Buried in Your Backyard

The Dead People I’ve Buried in Your Backyard

By Faith Ifft

There’s a lot of people buried back there.

Some with respectful burials—

Complete with flowers and headstones,

And the ground watered with tears.

These are the ones I miss—

The ones I regret letting go.

Others are dumped like garbage,

Thrown out with disgust.

Their flesh rots away in the sun,

Peeling and being eaten away by worms.

These are the ones I’m glad to be rid of—

The ones that left my mouth with a sour taste.

Some have a little dirt thrown on top,

Like a sign of neutrality.

They rot like the others, but they’re older.

Their faces have eroded, their flesh sagging.

These are the ones I didn’t hate,

But couldn’t bring myself to miss.

You probably wonder why I chose you

And your poor backyard to be my cemetery.

I guess it’s because you’re the one person

I never want to bury in the remote corners of my mind.

You’re the one I never want to lose.

The one who makes it easier to breathe.

You know them all—every name,

Every face and every story.

I tell you everything that happened,

I tell you what they did to me,

Why they left me

Or why I let them go.

You share my burden—

The skeletons in my closet.

You’re my cemetery for all my painful memories.

And in my backyard, I’m sure I’ll find the corpses

Of those who hurt you buried there.

I’m you’re cemetery too.

We help each other get over the bodies—

The people we bury to forget.

We help each other heal from those that left us, And the ones we couldn’t save.