Grave goods

We wrapped you in words
Finely handwritten
Block type
Labels
Cursive script
Crowding conversations of memory
Until you were covered
Vanished beneath an image of yourself
In the language of others

Those who had something to say
Covered the ears of your mourners
With speeches
Epitaphs
Hymns
History
Sculpting a new body for you
A smiling corn effigy
Waving from golden autumn days
In the easy sunlight of forgetting

The paid craftsmen came in
To still you in stone
Chiseled
Carved
Etched
Proofs against sun, rain and time
Sealed and seamed with care
In the carefully lidded box of recall
Your new role in the community
Among the mileposts
White yardsticks from now to then

But their ritual seal didn't close me
The words between us still pour out
Scraps
Letters
Tatters
Tugging at the lines between me
And your immobile ghost
I lay the notes on their memorial for you
And leave them behind
For the wind to scatter weightlessly
Into the unsuspecting yards of strangers