Nothing ruins a death more
than a thick goulash of greed.
It simmers away
well after the funeral
when the grab for possessions
strips the house of furniture
and rugs,
eternity rings
and carnival glass.
Is this what follows
when the anchor fails,
when the bones of love
fracture and fall?
Karen Knight was born in Tasmania. She has been widely published and anthologised since the early 1960’s. She has written four collections of poetry, her most recent Postcards from the Asylum (Pardalote Press, 2008), won the 2005 Dorothy Hewett Flagship Fellowship Award, the 2007 ACT Alec Bolton Poetry Prize and the University of Tasmania Prize (Tasmania Book Prizes 2011) for best book by a Tasmanian publisher.