Excerpts from
The Color of Being Buried
Fading off the bones and the beautiful erosion
Copyright © 2025 Greg Philby
Winter at the Retirement Home
Copyright © Greg Philby
There are no tracks
in the snow.
The children have all gone
inside their old bodies
and sit,
shaking in them.
They are there, cowered
in the frail light-heat,
with winter rattling
in their pipes.
One man’s old face
looks out
from under the window ice
with the slow gills
of a winter fish.
Once, he had boots.
And a sled.
There are no tracks
in the snow.
It comes cleanly,
loose and relentless
as a coroner’s sheet,
pulling tight to the throat
of the building,
up over
the little cracks and bones.
And the snow comes
and the sheet pulls up higher
and the snow comes.
The face, in ice, watches.
Copyright © 2025 Greg Philby
They're Making More, Now
Copyright © Greg Philby
They’re knocking out new ones
of clean skin and powder, their
teeth tiny seeds. They smell
of white sunlight. Here they come.
They will creep into the teachers’
dresses, take the worn seat on the
park bench where the old tramp
with split eyes has been sinking; they
will climb into a prostitute’s skin,
sell you your shoes, and make
the laws. There’s yours, now,
freshly made, eyes
all water and blank paper,
the one who will have your house
and take out your colors. And
there’s another wet-dripping with
spring who will have your ways.
Sleep, curl into your fetality, and
dream if you will. Clutch your god
or your liquor. It doesn’t matter.
They’re making more, now. You can
hear them coming, can’t you.
Copyright © 2025 Greg Philby
A Lamp is on in Lucy's Room
Copyright © Greg Philby
A lamp is on in Lucy’s room.
She sits beside it, still as stone.
She’s fought her battles with the world
now sinks in twilight, all alone.
Mind and flesh in dusty shawl
soften in the heavy gloam.
A lamp is on in Lucy’s room
though she is not the least aware.
Her work and kids, well-fed off her,
leave her to moulder in her chair.
Remnants from her wars and loves
dissolve as tepid breath in air.
There’s just her clock of heart, so dull,
marking time as thoughts subside.
The light enwraps as coffin sheet
o’er all the things in life she tried.
A boy courts girl, a bird sings shrill,
in fresh and youthful night outside.
The lamp burns on in Lucy’s room
who knows when she last felt alive.
The lamp burns on in Lucy's room.
And no one knows when she first died.
Copyright © 2025 Greg Philby
Old Men Eating Soup
Copyright © Greg Philby
Around the table
4 old men
stoop over soup bowls,
their eyes soft boiled
their heads blanched white
except the one
with glossy black hair,
a slick elixir
to fend away age.
Age found him anyway.
It delights in him,
knocking his hands about
and garnishing his skin.
He is steeped in it.
The 4 old men
clink spoons like grave shovels,
bit by bit
hollowing out their places
and scraping down
to winter glaze.
Except the one.
Beneath the cooling soup
his spoon breaks open
a hole his size,
dark, moist black,
the color of being buried,
the color of fear,
the color of his hair.
Copyright © 2025 Greg Philby
Mary at the Shore
Copyright © Greg Philby
Mary walked out to the shore,
the waters stoic, blue.
And in the lake she saw herself,
and saw she wasn’t true.
Her shallow image floated there,
translucent, light on dark,
and underneath the film of skin
she saw she had no heart.
The reflection boldly met her gaze
but looked with dormant eyes,
and Mary felt the hollow cold
from passions she’d denied.
The image faltered on the waves.
It pled with her to stay.
But Mary only hung her head,
then turned and walked away.
Copyright © 2025 Greg Philby
Poker Tuesday
Copyright © Greg Philby
It’s Tuesday, Poker Night. Three
of the old gang lie
dealt out beneath the grass.
Larry, his hand drawn
over his chest hollow, an
empty bluff. Lucky, spaded
under with all his good fortune,
impassive and face up. Howard
in his bone clutter, absent
minded; fatted grackles turn up his
easy grubs. And here’s the fourth,
slowly driving by
in his smooth car,
stiff on the velvety cloth,
sealed up in the glass. There’s
a full house in his mouth.
It’s Tuesday, Poker Night. The red
sun folds on the stones.
The birds with black wings call.
The Tuesdays come, and they come.
Copyright © 2025 Greg Philby
Women Underground
Copyright © Greg Philby
Edna St. Vincent Millay
She who longed for death's embrace,
who lusted for its bed.
She who begged the mouths of worms,
how happy she lay dead.
Sara Teasdale
Feel the quiver in the grave grass!
Still she rustles in her room.
Feel her open eyes stare starward.
Still she spirits in her tomb.