<\/p>\n
When we brought your ashes to the beach<\/strong><\/p>\n at the end of Pilgrim Road, I poured them out<\/strong><\/p>\n as fast as I could, standing knee-deep<\/strong><\/p>\n in the seaweedy shallows, because it had started<\/strong><\/p>\n to rain, and I didn\u2019t want you to get wet.<\/strong><\/p>\n What was I thinking? You were returning<\/strong><\/p>\n to our first mother, the sea. But all I wanted<\/strong><\/p>\n to do was gather up every gritty particle,<\/strong><\/p>\n every chip of bone, then mix them with my bare<\/strong><\/p>\n hands, using sand and mud, saliva and tears,<\/strong><\/p>\n and bring you back, my own personal golem.<\/strong><\/p>\n How could I have let you sift out of my fingers,<\/strong><\/p>\n grain by grain? The heavier bits sank, mixed<\/strong><\/p>\n with the broken shells; the lighter ones blew<\/strong><\/p>\n in the wind, stuck to the patches of foam.<\/strong><\/p>\n How can you be gone?<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n first appeared in South Carolina Review, 2011, <\/i>to appear in the forthcoming book Gold. Barbara Crooker<\/em> (2013 or 2014) in the Poeima Poetry Series of Cascade Books, a division of Wipf & Stock.<\/span><\/strong> www.barbaracrooker.com<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n