for I sense this, I'll die in Mississippi,
state with the sing-songiest name
I remember, at five, learning to spell—
when I die here,
my singular stone will stand alone
among the Falkners and Faulkners,
the Isoms and the Neilsons, these headstones
which fin down hills like schools of fish.
I'll be a letter of a foreign font,
what the typesetter used to call a bastard.
And even when my husband and daughter
are dragged down beside me,
their shared name
won't seem to claim my own,
not to any horseman passing by.
Listen, kin and stranger,
when I go to the field and lie down,
let my stone be a native stone.
Let the deer come at dusk
from the woods behind the church
and let them nibble acorns off my grave.
Then let the kudzu blanket me,
for I always loved the heat,
and let its hands rub out my name,
for I always loved affection.
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