We are veterans of dead bones,
products of love, and its loss,
memorizers of last breaths,
and what letting go feels like.
The front line of memory gives way,
what we held in our hands,
dissolves, like water on clay–
muddy water, returning
to muddy ground, then dust;
it is a fate that awaits all of us:
empty arms, encircled of sacred air,
grasping at remnants
of what we valued there.