There was a breathlessness
at her departure that morning,
a fearfulness at her absence,
magnolias the colour of her linen.
So old, her bones had become
like the handles of her coffin,
her knuckles fixed, clasped,
marrying her to death;
she his bride, he her groom
taking off her flesh,
laying her out.
The creak runs dry.
The high cypresses
whisper casuarinas
in a wavering voice,
a sibilance in the wind.
Her sheets are quiet now,
the pillows sunk
into the shape of her head,
the nape of her neck.
The room is as she left it
with the odour of her last smell
from a crumpled hanky
tucked under the mattress;
a stale perfume of eau de Cologne.
We had to untwine
the rosary beads from her fingers.