What’s left of you is in boxes,
Mother-that-kissed-goodnight.
Who introduced us to stallions and
Bullet hole portraits of John Wayne.
How to be on trail. Avoid poison oak,
Ivy. How to avoid horse buck.

Your parents stopped praying
The rosary after you went terminal.
Reader who believed in a book
For her and a book for the kids.
Stephen King and R.L. Stine.

What remains of you are stills. Above the refrigerator.
Beside the TV.
One of when unseen bass swam through your shins.
Rivers rose and drowned the lilly pads.
Sunk the cattails. You wore the geranium dress,
Murky up to your knees. A hand on the dog.

You’re coffin’s in the ground,
Kathryn. The prenatal nurse.
The one who brought hers to
Rainbow island for fish and family,
Not for lighting clap and sideways rain.
But don’t worry, never mind that.

Thanks to cancer, you are bones.

Some believe you were reborn a cardinal. Nested
To watch your children listen for bats at dusk.

Their echoes unconfirmed,
And your songs too faint.