A Grim Awakening

By Charlotte Zheng, The Bishop's School '29

"Weight of the World on Your Shoulders" By Leanne Fan, Westview High School 26'

You can always see your nose, but your eyes ignore it,

because it’s always there—

Kind of like the monotonous hum of the AC in the jammed room.

The walls are yellowing; a crack splits across the wall behind the officiate.

The ceilings are low. A light flickers.

The AC is too loud.

An ominous tension hangs heavy over the bowed heads.

Grief— 

A lingering rain cloud. 

It will pass;

The storm will pass; 

The storm always passes. 

But death never passes.

It is a permanent state.

All around, there’s sniffling. People crying. 

The air is stuffy and thick. 

Somehow,

it seems darker,

grayer.

It reeks of salt now, too.

There’s a lady—head of white hair, lilac fascinator pinned perfectly into place. 

She looks to be somewhere in her sixties.

The person lying in the casket 

wasn’t 

even 

forty-five.

The lady reaches into her Louis Vuitton purse and pulls out a glinting compact mirror.

She looks into the mirror and dabs her glazed eyes with a tissue,

blinking fast.

She looks into the mirror,

closer.

Something in her face changes. 

Her eyes narrow. Her lips harden.

She drags her pointer finger over a line connecting the edges of her nose and mouth.

She frowns. 

The compact mirror snaps shut. The Louis Vuitton purse zips closed.

Her gaze refixates on the front of the somber room.

She looks straight ahead,

past the rows of people,

past the officiate,

past the casket,

past the back wall,

through the crack,

somewhere far away, 

lost.

Lost in the mirror—

what she saw, and 

what it means. 

A grim awakening.

She ignores the tip of her nose.