How Sacrilege Happens, poem by James R. Whitley

Thus, Death is the magic portal
transforming every casualty of war—
no matter if the fight was fought

internally or on foreign soil,
no matter if the deceased were
sleeping soldiers or mere passers-by—

into something exalted, better
than they were when here.
But isn’t this travesty?

Or worse, a form of disrespect?—
the thick mask of make-up on the corpse,
the fool’s gold of the eulogy.

As if to say to the dearly departed that,
if left unprocessed, raw,
your humanness is unpalatable,

that we can’t appreciate you like this:
perfectly silhouetted in the afterglow
of your many radiant imperfections.