The last few days have been painful.  I wonder if that means I’m growing?  Isn’t that the saying “no pain, no gain”?

Eulogy For the Profane
by Michael Romani

They say profanity
Is the sign of a lazy mind
All stops to my vanity
I wonder what they were hoping to find

I've never been one
To think myself clever
Instead, mostly undone
With most of my endeavors

But, always willing to try
Again and again 'til I get it right
No matter how many times I'd sigh
Doing my best to take things light

Would it be too much to show appreciation?
I ask with weak feigned fascination...

Today, they tell me I lost another friend
He was always one on whom I could depend
My mentor, my friend and my boss
And if I look a mess, it's well felt loss

An aneurysm took him from us today
Like a train wreck, I cannot look away
I whisper all of this to myself
Feeling the grief in pages from my shelf

Knowing that I can't tell this to you
After the things I say and that I do
But, I have no one else despite the strain
While feeling like you hold me in disdain

Charles was the very best among good men
We would share a whiskey every now and then
As he did his best to offer sage advice
About how all our decisions in life have their price

I would sit there doing my best to listen
Knowing that in slurred speech where were points missing
And as I would think on all his soldierly ways
I thought he would be a friend for all of my days

All the times he caught me as I was falling out
Every time he urged me to believe in me despite my doubts
I lift another whiskey to his honor and his glory
He was the best kind of a soldier's story

He made it back to carry on with his duty
Caring for others until death took him so rudely
And quietly and quickly like the reaper's whisper
It makes me think and from this I infer

I wish I could talk to you and tell you and ease my pain
Gazing into your eyes of love and not of disdain
But, instead I know I caused you too much pain
And the hope that you might still love me is insane

Waiting for a funeral and your last goodbyes
And all I can do is hang my head and cry

(c) August 13, 2019  Michael Romani
All Rights Reserved