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Empires made of bone and ash
A set of doves, the colour of peace, was released and fluttered into the clear blue sky, wings beating like sharp handclaps.
- Kevin Martin, Special to Gulf News
- Published: 23:39 September 10, 2008
A set of doves, the colour of peace, was released and fluttered into the clear blue sky, wings beating like sharp handclaps. In a matter of seconds they resembled minute white specks turning tinier even as the sharpest sighted among the mourners struggled to keep track of them from the graveside.
Presently they were lost to sight altogether. Focus returned to the final ritual - that of lowering the casket. The casket: An expensive-looking, professionally designed structure made of very obviously expensive wood - cedar or ash or oak - and polished so highly it gleamed with mirror-like aspiration, reflecting the cars parked across the way - reds and silvers - and also the legs and feet of the ones assembled - grey and black and somber brown.
Shiny gold-plated handles ringed the box winking occasionally as a sunbeam glanced off a surface. There it sat on a mound of dug up earth, moments before it was scheduled to ceremoniously disappear into the bowels of the earth, signifying an interment.
Suddenly a solemn voice interrupted the proceedings, making an announcement. "Ladies and gentlemen, I'm afraid you will have to leave at this stage. The husband of the departed is too distraught and cannot stay and has asked for his dearly beloved to be lowered in total privacy."
One does not interrupt at this juncture and state: "But it is my right. I want to witness the entire ritual, ensure closure." Socially, morally and ethically it doesn't seem right. So, along with the others one slowly shuffles away, after paying a final two-seconds' worth of last respects.
Months go by. Maybe even a year. Then, quite by chance one gets chatting with another acquaintance who's undergone a similar bereavement and - surprise, surprise - was in similar manner disgruntled at not being able to "close the chapter" on the person whose final ritual he was attending.
Privacy again. Somewhere in one's mind a few dots are beginning to appear, as though in readiness saying, "Connect us." But sometimes dots don't connect as easily as they suggest. They're there, but the mind balks. Could this really be happening, it asks.
Can one be sure? Couldn't two separate families have sought absolute privacy leaving just the undertakers and their staff to dispose of the final details - the lowering of expensive timber and the shovelling of that repressive mantle of earth? Of course they could!
Acquaintance
At about that time the acquaintance leans in and says quietly, "Do you know what my Ronny saw the other day, driving through the remote suburb of Pineridge (or it could have been Pinecrest, or Pinecroft)? Hundreds upon hundreds of cheap wooden boxes all shaped like coffins."
The mind boggles at the thought. Could this be happening? Are these two incidents and the cheap boxes in Pine-something in some way linked? One is not sure. One certainly didn't personally witness the opulent gold-handled casket make its final six-foot descent.
Nor did the acquaintance, in this instance. But here is something so purely speculative that to allege anything further might even seem disrespectful to the departed and the ones that prepare such a fitting program - flowers and doves and long black gleaming vehicles.
The acquaintance leans in close again to say, "The doves are homing pigeons. They are trained to fly away and find their way back to the undertakers premises." So, allegedly, even that symbolism is not allowed to work - the essence of the departed is - on the surface - allowed release then lured back, it would seem. It costs a lot to live, as we all know, in these days of galloping price hikes. It costs a tremendous amount to die as well.
Funeral fees leave those still living reeling. The dead who pay handsomely for that final cloak must not be allowed to leave wearing a cheap coat. It would be shameful and disrespectful if institutions build their profits on the bones and ashes of the departed. If, that is, such a thing is happening.
Kevin Martin is a journalist based in Sydney, Australia.
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