My Death Will Be Covered Up
Chris Haven
Because it will be spectacular:
On a street corner waiting for a sign—
Spontaneous combustion. A puddle of flame-
retardant clothes, confetti of skin-ash,
light bulb hand insisting DON'T WALK,
my charred skull settles toward the sky.
It will surely happen this way.
Witnesses stare open-mouthed, blink dull lids.
They will scoop the still warm ash into their hands
and offer it gravely to the wind, seal
the orbits of my eyes with putty, fill my skull
with shot, drop it hissing into the river.
They will carry the secret in their bodies,
pass it jealously to their newborn children.
If I don't believe this, how can I live?
They will not speak, for fear voice would crack
the skin from their own shaking bones.
My death covered up like my life before it,
a conspiracy, a scattering of silence,
buried beneath the lips of the multitude,
dumb lips unable to bring a word to life.
Self-Guided Tour
Chris Haven
No one asked me to dedicate this building,
but I will anyway. I like the way
it defines its space, reaching to vanish,
stone staking claim on the ragged air,
bounding all it blocks inside, every breath
from every lung that entered. Long after
we're gone they'll try to catch the dust we've left.
Not enough, but I give you this building—
I give you the walls the roof and the pitch,
sign of a time when we built in image
of one breath, this place that's taken them all.
Chris Haven
