Small Ashes

By John I. Blair

Soon you’ll be small ashes
Hidden in a bronze urn
Sealed in thick cement
Behind a lettered metal plaque

With just your name and dates
And four wise words –
What words we haven’t yet decided,
But something you’d have liked.

I know we once agreed
That when this day arrived
I’d find a way to carry you
Back to the ocean you so loved,

Stand at the long pier’s end
And scatter your remains
Far across the waters
For fish and gulls to take.

But now I’m old and cannot
Make that journey, quite;
And our young granddaughters
Need someplace they can go

To visit Grandma.
So we’ve found this spot
Just heartbeats from their home
Where there’s a sunny bench,

A splashing fountain,
Trees, flowers, birds,
And funny, furry squirrels
To dash atop the wall that holds your urn.

The girls can sit there,
Remember you, your smile,
Your laughing love for them,
And not feel sad or lonely.

And who knows? Someday,
Eons in the future, out of ken,
Your atoms yet may float
Into the great, eternal sea.

For Clara, 1942-2013

©November 2013 John I. Blair