Boatman drifts us close
to where they burn bodies, holy
fires laid out in steps, bizarre
black-tinged shade of ochre bleeding
into the perennial river.
Sweet cooking smell of newly
washed flesh, an occasional wail, circling
bird-clouds and throat-swells
of chanting—bells clanging—
Would you like to hear the crackle
of splitting skull, he asks.
I am thinking of you, bony and long
fingered—face smashed in, they said—
head filled to the brim
with the next miraculous thought
stirred with a spoon of madness, a pinch
of butterfly lightness—
They said your skull did not
cleave easily and your young woman’s wrists
snapped impatiently—bangles lost—
I speak to the boatman. Beg him
to pray for your salvation, absolution of intact
skull, clean white smoke from
healed wounds and soft gray ash as
a sign of forgiveness. He asks for
money, and another pyre lights up the sky.
