Cardboard Urn

After the funeral, your hair

and skin baked to ash,

your body brought back in a gray box

with a bag of soot inside,

box and bag on a pedestal by the table,

your brother came to see you.

He asked where you were,

and when I said By the table

he thought I said On the table

and he said Here?

peeking under the lid

of an empty drinking cup,

as though we had gone

to the local Kwik Stop

for gas and fountain drinks

then decided what the hell?

and used a cardboard Pepsi cup

for our mother’s urn.

He actually thought that,

and his eyes got wide

as he stood in the dining room,

unspeakably appalled,

staring at that cup

and mother, oh sweet jesus

how I wanted to laugh.