the shoulders are the dampest,

soaked with exchanged comfort and bittersweet grief.

amidst the mourning there’s always the systematical process of the farewell –

the only way to guide us to the true end.



we do it with fire

to purify, to cleanse, to return to dust.



we kindle affections, relations, intentions,

and nurture a flame that always grows out of control,

leaving loss and lament to burn our hearts.



condolences blur into a soft hum,

nothing unites us in our differences but

sometimes it only takes the pathos of cremation to realize that

ashes, ashes, we all fall down.