Home Cremation 

Let’s take matters into our own hands.
I will bring the matches and you can
Chop down the cypress tree. 
I have a special fireplace where we 
Can make dust of all our faults. 
Scatter them like seed in fallow worlds.
At what temperature does bone
Give in to fire? We were fed to lions
And made our way through meat and organ 
Like cave explorers. What do you call 
A flashlight without a face. Burials 
Are for men and woman and I am 
Neither. I need only a sofa to sleep on.
Lamp in the corner slowly turning angel.
In every closet we keep materials 
That need to be burned: telephones 
And hope chests and even the dolls.
You ask me who should go first. 
You’re holding a match like a dog leash.
I volunteer. Open my mouth wide enough
To swallow a deer. Hooves trampling 
My desires to be kept. Tell me 
How easy would it be to talk
Only to flames? My ash, a sifted shadow.
Use old shoes as urns. Keep my earrings 
In a glass bowl to be mistaken for fruit.