Grave Lights

Light rain on Vinohradská, and the woman at the cemetery gate setting out her stock in rows: red glass cups, the tin lids punched with a ring of holes, the wax already poured.

A boy with a plastic scythe under his arm stops to look. His father says, not those, ours goes in the pumpkin.

She doesn't argue. She wipes the rain off one with the edge of her sleeve and puts it back.

Tonight the faces on the sills, tomorrow the names on the stones, and the same small flame out of the same box of matches,

not caring much who it is for, only whether the wind will let it.