the happy ending

The Happy Ending

At the funereal, open casket, he noticed the dead man
had an expensive diamond ring on his middle finger;
the same night, before the earth had settled into hard
labour he, lets call him Harry, dug open the grave,
stole the ring, as he didn’t bother to fill in the grave
again the story was in the papers next day, apparently
the ring was fake. An unlucky man walked to the end
of the pier, where the sea is dark and shadows of fear
dance; flung the ring into its depth; plop, as a fleeting
hush cast a shroud of silver on the water. Harry, being
tall and bad on his feet, lost his balance fell in the sea
as well, since he couldn’t swim; screamed for help, as
drowning people do, and as always the echo of despair
made the sea cringe. The ring was swallowed by a cod
that was angled by an elderly fisherman, at dawn he sold
it at the fish-market? It was bought by a widow, who,
when gutting the cod, found a diamond ring, it wasn’t
a fake and happy, at last, retired to the Antibes