when i'm done <br />with this ash and dust <br />wrap me in the quilt <br />my mother and my father's mother <br />sewed together <br />put my body in a simple <br />pine box if a box you must <br />this should be enough <br />to keep the carnivores <br />from clawing at the earth <br />but there in the ground <br />which covers my body <br />plant a young oak tree <br />so that when i'm done and done <br />more dust than bone <br />what's left will nourish <br />the tree as it grows <br />and when you visit <br />year after year to the tree <br />think of your child and your brother <br />becoming the air that you breathe <br />a way of returning <br />all that you gave to me <br /> <br />(march 2010, new orleans, la, usa)<br /><br />Thomas Quentin Sims<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/to-the-tree/
