Christian Poetry: 'Thoughts From the Cemetery'

I wrote this poem in pondering the many souls represented in a cemetery and where they might be in eternity. Each person is valuable. They were someone's mother or father, sister or brother, neighbor or friend.

Oh, where are my own relatives who have gone before? What about the present day and those still living? Do I care enough about the eternal destination of those in my life to share the Gospel with them?

Waiting at the red light

Next to the cemetery

I got lost in my thoughts reading the names

My eyes scanned the rows

Stretching over the hillside

The lives the past hundred years had claimed

And I wondered which gate

Had welcomed their souls

When they joined the world without end

These fathers and mothers

Sons and daughters

Brothers and sisters

Neighbors and friends

Then flashing through my mind

The faces of those I've known

I got lost in my thoughts and memories

I was gripped with regret

For the proud silence I'd kept

Still I hoped they'd seen something bright in me

And I wondered which gate

Had welcomed their souls

When they joined the world without end

My aunts and uncles

Second cousins

Fellow classmates

Neighbors and friends

Later I passed the farmland

Its rich, cultivated soil

It was the time of year for sowing

And I nodded my head...