The Kramat

“Then prayed I many a prayer to the sickly death’s-heads” — Ezra Pound, Canto I

Seven guinea fowl call Your name between
the worn out graves of real believers,
scratched out in strange glyphs
on black slate, and two restful places
a little apart from the rest,
one with simple bricks, painted white
and one with just a headstone.

No writing, no hint or clue about who
it was they buried here - even the green
cloth covering the grass which now grows
has been cut out and carried off
by this uncaring world
which sees only the surface and not
what lies buried beneath; what gives
the grass its particular feeling
when you kneel down and die in it.

Here lies fate, in some unknown place
with no name, no face, no small words
left to give away: just the empty centre
carved out by what really lasts
and a white stone so bright
that when the living come to reflect,
they can barely open their eyes
in the overwhelming light
that lives still.