Grave Digging

I haven't been able to write much beyond my master's thesis recently (successfully defended); when I did get free moments, poetry was what came. I graduated yesterday (!!), so: a poem to celebrate.

[Dedicated to Lucy Ella Hunsen: for believing in me, and for being so full of light.]

Etch my sister’s name over my grave,
let her be the hex of protection over my body’s decomposition.

the first person to ever love me unconditionally, the second person i ever loved back.

If i’m cremated,
Let the earthworms consume and excrete my remains.
Pour my embers out in the soil of Ringer Park
perhaps a plant will grow through the cluster of dust that was once my heart.

In death, let me be useful; let me feel roots sink into sand that was once my ass,
grass seeking nitrogenous supplements from dirt mixed in with particles of ash.

my legacy, beyond conflicted memory, will be the 
tags i left;
the cracks of stone which broke under my bones as i hurtled my body 
down stair sets;
the posters i left in Philly, the stories i told in Cleveland, the landlords i screwed in Boston,
the homies whose hands hold imprints of our fellowship, before 
i lost them.

Call my peoples’ names out.
hold them tight and fight with them as i would have,
apologize as i would have,
Break bread and write lead together and send letters to our incarcerated betters,
Allow yourself all the shit i held back from, do what i would never,

Read all the poems on Cambridge’s sidewalks,
Trace all of the oral historical monuments along Southwest Corridor Park,
Stick your finger in that half-dry concrete and trace out the initials of your love,
Remember yourself—before anyone can forget you.

If i am to die nameless, in tragedy or in peace,
with nary a wish to apply to a nobody,
i hope they bury me loose, or leave me in a ditch;
A simple fool like me needs no funeral, desires no party.