I know this isn't the heaven we wanted.

When you leave my mind,
the last piece of you to leave
is your hands.

When you go to the earth
the last part of you visible
above what is either sand or clay
isn't a hand, but a glowing shroud.

The black goose
with your name in its throat
and my name in its stomach
will cough you up with her hoots:
part jelly, part watch,
part bone, part me,
part power.

There is a dead language buried in English.
There is a word no one remembers

for a temple
with a bowl of millet sealed
in each brick.
When you are buried, the word
will grow a ssa sound.
Its meaning will change
to specify you as the builder.

No one can speak the language you will rewrite.
I know this isn't the heaven we wanted.
What ever is?

And soon I'll join you
amid the terms
for tiny bottles of defunct potions
and together we'll bury
our own particular I love you.

I wouldn't mind its being sealed off with us, in our brick of earth.

[Max Ritvo {1990-2016}, 'The Watercolor Eulogy' from Four Reincarnations]