Let's Pretend

For the last two years bloggers all over the world have been posting their favorite poetry on February 2, to celebrate the Feast of Brigid, or Groundhog Day. Let's pretend it's the 2nd, here is my entry:

The Dead

The dead are always looking down on us, they say,
while we are putting on our shoes or making a sandwich,
they are looking down throught the glass bottom-boats of heaven
as they row themselves slowly through eternity.

They watch the tops of our heads moving below in earth,
and when we lie down in a field or on a couch,
drugged perhaps by the hum of a warm afternoon,
they think we are looking back at them,

which makes them lift their oars and fall silent
and wait, like parents, for us to close our eyes.

Billy Collins