Grave Hunting

Mikayla Leskey | Arts and Entertainment Editor

In our freetime, my best friend and I walk through cemeteries

it’s weird to say aloud but it’s also one of our favourite things

we joke and laugh, and maybe the ghosts are joining us

we call it “grave hunting” 

us searching for our favourite headstones 

telling each other that’s the one we want when we die

or i’ll stare up at a weeping Angel 

telling him we’re getting one for our garden one day

that it doesn’t matter if he’s watched one too many Dr. Who episodes

we’re going to have a weeping angel overlooking us

whenever we see a grave taller 

than the rest we’ll turn to each other and smirk;

“nothing could beat Henry’s”

with his 36 foot tall headstone in our hometown

we’d call it the biggest d*ck contest

it might be disrespectful to the dead 

but he’s a skeptic

and i’ve already been cursed by two gods 

so what’s one more 

the cemetery we visit the most is the one 

my Grandpa and Aunt and Great Aunt are buried at

it’s only a town over and I know the way by heart

i’ll stand in front of My Grandpa’s grave, 

my aunt buried next to him and

 I hope they’re happy with what I’ve done with my life so far

even if it’s walking through strangers’ cemeteries

tracing over dates and names,

trying to figure out what they say in their deteriorated state

“perpetual care” is the only thing legible most of the time

maybe they’ll be proud of us visiting ghosts 

that haven’t had a visitor in decades

or maybe they’ll say I’m disrespecting them

that I should be shunned for even thinking

about living in resting places

my best friend has to pull me away before

all the thoughts weigh down over me

we’ll walk the familiar gravel path

glimpsing at flower-named stakes for connection

and trail markers

we laugh and we joke and we push each other over

and maybe there’s ghosts joining us

happy to be apart of a conversation again

laughing at our jokes or trying to push us over too

or maybe they sit at their graves, disturbed by our laughter

disgusted at the two noisy teens for giggling in the

silence of the dead.