No Epitaph – Marie Hutchinson

“Come with me to the hill.  That’s where I’d want to be.

You’ll see.”  A circle of five gnarled, bone-dry pines,

sentinels for shepherds on their way to the fairs. “Many

a ghost wanders here, and one day in their company

I’ll lie, facing the sun and in the lee of rain from the west.

It will do me, plenty of fresh air, fine view, in peace I’ll rest.”

How we laughed! We walked on, the dogs in front.

He died on a summer’s day in early November. Not a

cloud in the sky. His life slid softly into death.  A sigh,

no pain, no more.  The doctor said: “It’s like a volcano.”

 “What about his ashes?” the family wanted to know.

“Over there, on the hill, among the trees” I replied.

Circle within a circle, huddled and hunched we stood,

The trees were whispering, tuned to a chill north wind.

Afterwards, I tied a bird box above, for future neighbours.

His ashes, not the powdery dull dust, but bonfire grey

coarse flakes, lay undisturbed for weeks. How I wished

for some resurrection, a new growth maybe? The January

storms thought otherwise.  I’d lost him for a second time.

Months later, friends came to stay. “We want to say hello!”

“Where on earth is he?” The irony! I smiled and pointed.

“What? No stone, boulder or plaque? Only ivy and moss?

Surely an inscription? A short epitaph?” I was at a loss.

What to say of the dead who’s still alive? What quandary!

Should I opt for the chronological, dry and logical?

“Born 6^th June 38 – Died 6^th November 07.”

Or the military, grandiose and rhetorical?

“This man won the war, but no wish for medals.”

Or should I choose the poetical?

“Two roads diverged in a wood and I…”

In the end, none of these, I know he understands.