Tribute to a friend

~the following was written as a tribute to a co-worker who died a massive heartattack. still in his early fifties...none of us got a chance to say goodbye to him~

I buried a friend today,
but I don't have the
right...to call him friend
truer still he was a
coworker of mine
seeing him in his coffin like
a wax figure in some arcade
There laid the man
whom for almost ten years pissed me off
or made me laugh

At work he was none too fast
yet not too slow
he was just Gary
moving at his own pace
His humor had an edge
and I guess
over the last few years, because of this
I felt him as kin
The man had a sharp wit
on which more than one
supervisor had bled
This had made me grow
to like the man

What did I know
about him...
very little
I knew his boy had downsyndrom.
I'd heard he was a great dad.
I figured his wife was a saint
...hell...most
wives are...to tolerate us men.

So when I got the news
ol' Gary had
fled...it was then I realized
...yes...he was a friend

My wife, she'd worked
with him too...
So I knocked off half a day
at work...
knowing full well, some things are
more important then pay.
I, dressed all in black
my wife in her only dress
together we went to
see the body ol' Gary
had fled.

We walked in, I
trying to be stoic
my wife holding
my hand
she signed the register
and dropped a card
in the box
while I looked upon
the room that held
most of the folks
whom held Gary's love

Not knowing anyone
we stuck to business
at hand...looked at
some pictures of the life
of my new found friend

Amazing it seems,
our life so full, to be
snuffed out in seconds
for the nevermore
I mean, in that room
was the woman Gary
loved, who gave him
two kids I knew
he loved.
A young teen named
John and a girl named
Jennifer, the names
Gary and his wife
Carole had chosen
in some maternity room
not so long ago

At the pictures we
stared and in them we say
a family man
smiling with pride
with his loved ones
around him, we
saw Gary with hair
and no stubbled chin at all
we saw a Gary turned gray
sporting a mustache just as
gray...We saw the
Gary I'd come to know with little if
any hair at all
we saw the friend
I'd came to know
as Gary

I guess I'll never
understand
why a god can take
away a man before his time,
take him away from
a family still growing
take him away from
a woman who still
loves him...ya see...
Gary was only 54
when his heart stopped
beating, and he seemed more then
happy with life and
where life was leading

Then, with our hands
clasped tight, I led
my wife to the
box...that held the body
...that only a few
days past...held life
There laid Gary,
dressed as I wish to go
blue jeans, a work
shirt, ball cap by
his head....
his skin seemed of
wax...but there laid
Gary...the man
I'd come to know as friend.

Around his casket
on stands...flowers,
which, as well as
life...connotes death
my Wife and I, we
looked at the tags
hoping to see "The US
Postal Service" on one.
with a sigh we'd found
instead, a bouquet
from our postal union to
stand as a symbol of
thought, in the stead of an
organization that had
forgotten him and
moved on...
with Gary, as well as with his coworkers,
we know the score
when management drops
the ball, as we know
it does so well,
we the workers pick it up,
march it in to even the score

We returned, once
more, to the box
that held Gary, and bid
him a last farewell.
As we left,
I saw Gary's
wife, Carole, his boy
named John, whom I knew must
be confused and going
through hell.
With a lump in my
throat, we stopped
to say a few
words, so inadequate,
how can any words
of sympathy help where
lives are shattered.
When I looked
in her eyes,
mumbling I was a
coworker of Gary's,
I knew then the
source of Gary's drive,
a good, strong woman,
he'd made as his bride
and although ceremony
dictates soft spoken
supportive words,
this lady didn't need
them to survive, of
course I should have
known, as I've said
here before...Gary's wife
is a saint, and in
her, as our eyes met,
I knew she had a
well of strength with
which to enter the
unkown.

We left the funeral
home, and with
relief I sighed.
Kissed my wife and
opened her car door
why is it, when we
see death, only then,
do we realize that
love is near.

And, now as I sit
and write, I understand
what almost looked
like a smile on
the body of my friend,
he knew
that Carole his bride
would do well in life
till they laid side by
side again.

Gary my friend, you
knew, with that smile
of yours, that time is
just a river, we're
all just fishin in.

Goodbye Gary.
See ya on the otherside.