Ashes

The label on the canister says it’s you.
But it doesn’t look like you.
It doesn’t sound or feel or smell like you;
I won’t believe this is what you’ve become.

Sifting through fine particulate,
I try to feel your lined face.

I study the grains and pieces of bone--
searching hard, but recognize none.
Just days ago, an embrace
couldn't fully contain you.
Now here you are, in just
the space of my palms,
so lightly borne.

I pray
that the part of you
that needs to be whole
for you,
has been restored in heaven,
so that these obliterated parts
will stop shaking in my hands.

My tears, they flood your sandy body,
but fail to put you back together.

I try to fathom every speck:
That this urn should house
your heart and brain,
your skin and eyes,
your womb and breasts,
your hands and hair.
It contains as well, your last day:
Your pain, your fear, then letting go--
the lungs that failed you in the end;
the morphine, too, was burned with you.

Some of me, as well, is ash--
for there will be no turning back.
No recovery of those parts
that Death fragments into dust.

I search the crumbs
over again, and know
that I am made of this.