Virginia Foley
Compostable
Cremate me not
Summer’s sear and humidity, my body damp between the sheets, hair glued to my pillow, can stay at bay. I favour sweaters, scarves, September equinox, or winter-sliding on the crust of our frozen lake, crystalline snow sparkling against a low, fading sun. My reward: a fireplace to warm me and light the night.
Put me in front of that fire, not within.
Entomb me not
Don’t pump my body plump with formaldehyde juice. I choose not to lie supine upon white silk so that mourners might coffin-gawk. No over-priced, flower-shopped bouquets surrounding my corpse; they’ll be tossed out in a day or two. No lid to close, no last look, no mechanical descent of a shiny casket into a concrete crypt. Such thoughts flare my asthma.
Unlike my ninety-four-year-old Mom.
She’s selected Package A: $7,482.00, which includes embalming, transport of remains, coordination of events, staff services, cleaning. It excludes casket, taxes and disbursements.
Cheque book in hand, we go to the expansive, expensive funeral home.
“Would you like a tea or coffee?” a suited-lady asks her.
“I guess so.”
“Mom.” I nudge her. “Would you like a tea or coffee?”
“Oh,” Mom says quietly. “I thought she said, would you like to see your coffin?”
Forget me not
Wrap my body in a soft, cotton shroud and lower me gently into the arms of Mother Earth. Layer me with flowers: black-eyed Susans, columbines, a few daisies. No strong-smelling lilies, no odorous roses, and please, no geraniums. I do not care for geraniums. Scoop shovelfuls of warm Canadian soil and drop them atop me, leaving me to meld with the land, to decompose naturally, with grace. One day, far from now, far from then, my composted remains may help nourish a tree, a red maple perhaps, under which my great-great-grandchildren may play, have a picnic, throw a snowball, or be shaded from the sear of the summer sun.
Virginia Foley writes overlooking Lake St. Clair in Ontario, Canada and her work has been published in literary, lifestyle and travel journals, including, Dorothy Parker’s Ashes, Read650, Talking Writing, Southshore Review, Canada’s History Magazine, and Dreamers Creative Writing, and is upcoming in 5 Minute Lit.