Now, when I walk
through the cemetery,
I say aloud the names
of the dead as I pass.
Elma. Clara. Brooke. Millie.
Now I know the gift
of saying the name,
how the syllables invite
an honoring of the life.
Rose. Charles. Harry.
There is one gray stone
that simply says brother.
Brother, I say as I pass.
By the time I reach
the marker for my son,
the air is alive with names.
Finn, I say, as I kneel
in the dirt. Finn.
Sometimes, when I pray,
it’s the only word
I know how to say.
Posts Tagged ‘cemetery’
Walking to the Grave
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged cemetery, grief, name on April 20, 2023| 8 Comments »
Lone Tree Cemetery, Mid-January
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged cemetery, compassion, friendship, grief, touch on January 19, 2023| 10 Comments »
for Clea
We can go up there, she said,
nodding to the where the grave marker
was buried beneath feet of snow.
She knew it meant post holing
up over our knees. Uphill.
This, I thought, is true friendship.
So we wallowed through drifts
and laughed as we tripped.
And when we arrived at the place
where the ashes of my boy are buried,
I cried. And she did what the living can do—
she held me. She stood with me there
waist deep in snow and held me,
with her two strong arms, she held me.
On All Souls
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged all souls, birthday, cemetery, day of the dead, moon, ohio on November 2, 2022| 8 Comments »
In the woods, in the dark
we stood amidst old gravestones,
their engravings mostly scrubbed by time.
And Jon played gong,
Robin played chimes
and Evie played bass recorder.
And Owl read of the wood,
Melissa spoke of good life
and I hummed and played the breath.
We spoke the names
of our beloveds who have left.
Some names were spoken
only in silence.
The half-moon joined our circle,
as if it, too, knew something
of loss. As if it were showing us
that sometimes what appears to be gone
is simply unseen.
We walked home in that half light.
An Open Thank You Letter to Kristen Who Works at the Cemetery
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged cemetery, compassion, labor day, tenderness on September 24, 2022| 14 Comments »
Her smile was clear sky, was green grass,
was slender stream of waterfall.
Her smile said, You are welcome here.
Her smile said, You are not alone.
She waved to me as I climbed the hill
to sit by the grave of my son and she offered
to water the flowers I’d brought from the garden.
Her offer was pink snapdragon, was orange marigold,
was golden calendula. Her offer said,
There are some things we can do.
Her offer said, I see you.
Thank you, I said. Thank you
for taking care of this place.
I looked around at the trim lawn,
the lovely, well-cared for space
where we bring our dead.
She shrugged and smiled and said,
We love Finn, and backed away,
her right hand pressed to her heart,
her eyes embracing mine.
There are moments so flooded with tenderness
every wall around our heart collapses
from the beauty of it,
and we are left wet and trembling, like newborns.
There are moments when we are so naked
love enters us completely, shakes us from within
and wrecks us, and there,
in the rubble of our defenses
we fall so deeply in love with life,
with the goodness of people,
we are remade.
When I left, she blew me a kiss.
I caught it. Twelve hours later,
I still cradle that kiss in my hand.
Choosing a Plot at the Cemetery
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged burial, cemetery, grief, paradox on May 31, 2022| 10 Comments »
We weave through tombstones,
the spring grass soft beneath our feet.
Thick roar of wind charges the valley.
Our paths braid up the hill
as we feel into where we will bury
the ashes and bone matter
of the boy who no longer breathes.
We all quickly agree on a place.
“It’s beautiful,” I say,
and fall into tears,
broken by the reason we’re here
in this stunning graveyard
rung with aspen and waterfalls,
red cliffs and spruce.
I lie on my back where he will be,
my husband beside me,
our daughter nearby,
above us all blue sky and sun.
The earth is cold and hard,
and the spot feels right to my body,
this body that carried him,
this body still learning
how not to hold.
We cry until we don’t.
Until whatever is unbreakable inside us
rises through the brokenness.
We dust the earth off our clothes
and walk arm in arm out the gate
where our lives go on, devastated and whole,
where the boy is missing,
where the boy is as present
as the wind.
Wrestled by Chaos
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged cemetery, chaos, lucky to be alive, play on November 4, 2020| 1 Comment »
This grave day when it seems
I cannot play, I do.
I go to the graveyard and find
someone who died on my birthday.
I sit at the small metal marker
and read poems about birth and death.
I sing “Another One Bites the Dust”
and dance in my bare feet.
And when the dog starts to scratch at the earth
and flings dirt all over my legs and lap,
I laugh at her great idea
and rub the dirt into my skin,
then cover myself in big handfuls of red dirt,
marking myself as dust.
Here, in the autumn sun
surrounded by tombstones
that have long since lost their names,
it’s so easy to remember
how short this life—
what a gift to be alive,
what a gift to be wrestled by chaos
and find myself still thirsty
for another day, another day.
Emergence
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged cemetery, death, poem, poetry, spirit on November 3, 2016| Leave a Comment »
Tell me, I said
to the cemetery stone,
how long before
our names are
prayers only
the lichen
can speak?
46th Birthday in Lone Tree Cemetery, Dia de los Muertos
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged birthday, cemetery, death, Dia de los Muertos, gratitude, poem, poetry on November 3, 2015| 3 Comments »
Past the grave of the baby girl,
past the grave of the beloved mother—
“we loved her,” it says in italic letters—
and past the grave with my birthday on it,
we find a tombstone greened in moss
with its names and dates long since lost.
The grass has nearly reclaimed the stone,
and we sit here together and talk for hours,
joyful expressions of dust as we laugh
and cry and remember just why
it is so damn sweet to be alive, to practice
what it means to love in the face of our impermanence.
All the leaves have left for the year,
but look at what remains—the chance
for sudden, immeasurable bliss
no matter what the season is.
On the Day of Mictecacihuatl
Posted in Uncategorized, tagged all souls, birthday, cemetery, day of the dead, death, life, poem, poetry on November 3, 2013| 6 Comments »
On a hill
in the sun
at the edge
of the grave
in the grass
let us meet
on the day
when the veils
are thin
between
the worlds—
and perhaps
the Aztec
goddess
will open
her fleshless jaw
so that all
the stars
fall out
as they did
today
so that we
might find them
inside
each other’s words
and speak
of darkness
with syllables
made
of light.