There Comes a Time in Your LIfe ...

Among people with whom I correspond a theme recurs -- it's because so many of us are in our seventies.  Our friends are passing away, we too often have to go to memorial services or funerals.  Today's poem by Ted Kooser, a favorite poet of mine -- he's a Kansasan who was Poet Laureate and won the Pulitzer Prize for his book Delights and Shadows, from which this poem comes.

                       Mourners

After the funeral, the mourners gather
under the rustling churchyard maples
and talk softly, like clusters of leaves.
White shirt cuffs and collars flash in the shade;
highlights on cheap green water.
They come this afternoon to say goodbye,
but now they keep saying hello and hello ,
peering into each other's faces,
slow to let go of each other's hands.