The Black Velvet Dress

My only designer dress

Is fully lined, black velvet

With a gathered full, knee-length skirt

Blouson sleeves that button at the wrist

A shirt-finished collar and tiny buttons

From waist to neck-line, spaced discreetly

To give the appearance of slits in the bodice

It is dignified, elegant and slightly sexy

All at the same time ...

And while I bought it for choir performances

And other formal occasions, I knew the moment

I tried it on - it would make a perfect funeral dress

In fact one day at my shrink's, while waiting for him

in his inner office perusing some snapshots

just picked up at one hour photo—

I had just found some of me in "the dress"

When he arrived and asked if he could see ...

He made admiring comments about the dress;

I mentioned it was my funeral dress and I remember

We had quite a conversation about that - how seldom

People wore formal attire to funerals these days,

Rarer still did they where black; he liked the idea

Of me having a funeral dress -

 Jokingly I told him

If he died before I did,

I'd wear it to his

Little did I know that less than six months later

I would don that  dress for the final time—

It was the last time I could bear to wear it—

As I attended his memorial ...

and that was days

Before I learned he had taken his own life ...

I might not have worn the dress  then

Had I known that salient detail

I still have the dress, in fact, still love it, but

It hangs limply in the back of my closet ...

A cruel reminder of how life can change on a dime

And beautiful formal black funeral dresses don't

Guarantee beautiful predictable futures ...

S.E.Ingraham©