Death is the moss on the headstone I remove with my thumb as a family member tells me how they need to clean the family graves. We bury the dead beneath the green flakes.

Death is the sweat down my back and the ache in my feet. It is the way funeral goers have come up to me to ask how I “deal with this”. I tell them it is beautiful, in it’s own tragic way.

Death is the water in the flower vases pouring down my arm and staining my uniform. It is cleaning leaves out the hearse. It is the smell of the prep room and the chill of the freezer, both not as bad as you’d think.

Death is a family member holding up a toddler to reach toward a dead relative they will not remember. It is the open casket. It is the slight awkward nature of closing it.

My Gods are death, and they’re slick and mean. They are cruel rot and crueler tears. They surround me with music and flowers. Butterflies eat from the cemetery stands. They take and they take and it’s all worth it. It’s all worth it to see them move their hands, mighty and skeletal.

I thank you, oh Gods. Thanatos, Hades, Persephone, I thank you for standing near me. There are so many flowers here.

Dark do come and sharpen my teeth, for the light will be thinning sometime soon. Goddess, curl within my bones and make the meat curl too.For you, murderous you, are the citadel to which I cling

Cold creep in and strengthen me! Make me hear the wind wail “Eurydice!”.O’ Persephone, make this winter bloom, and make the ground bloom too. For you, rose-crowned, are the final destination for me

"No! Go from me, to Eurydice:

I have lost her· there, have left death lately.

I will not ipiss the spring, the orphic boughs

perennial, chorded with golden leaves,

plucked by the·women, homey, unbidden,

naked in the wind, devouring;

"Nor looking back, heed your bitter howls

blown through the brutal winter of your hell,

love borne· annually to perpetual darkness

lost forever from this ravaged world;

"Nor immortal, mind your mother's cries, her curse,

the warmth .tripped from the light eternally,

the graying landscape, barren earth,

or the endless drift, the slow white hours . . .

-Steven Barry Katz

Because I could not stop for Death –

kindly stopped for me –

The Carriage held but just Ourselves –

And Immortality.

We slowly drove – He knew no haste

And I had put away

My labor and my leisure too,

For His Civility –

We passed the School, where Children strove

At Recess – in the Ring –

We passed the Fields of Gazing Grain –

We passed the Setting Sun –

Or rather – He passed Us –

The Dews drew quivering and Chill –

For only Gossamer, my Gown –

My Tippet – only Tulle –

We paused before a House that seemed

A Swelling of the Ground –

The Roof was scarcely visible –

The Cornice – in the Ground –

Since then – 'tis Centuries – and yet

Feels shorter than the Day

I first surmised the Horses' Heads

Were toward Eternity –

-Emily Dickinson