Please. Don’t allow any strangers to lie

on this ridge, or any backhoes to dig

into this ground. I need you

to make a shovel-opened,

shoulder-pried grave for me when I go.

Box me, don’t burn me: store me away

in a hillside I know like the bones

Dig down to a clay floor so water won't get in

too easy: while I want to die

quickly, I want my body to linger as long as it can,

at least a century between box and bare bones.

There is no way you can bury me

without entering the earth yourself. You need to know

that worms-eye view - feel the blade of the spade slicing

through roots of unknowable plants, see the rectangle

of trapped sky from the bottom of my grave.

Make certain it’s safe enough, deep enough,

square enough to hold my eternity.

Once I'm packaged and lowered,

the preacher has intoned his boilerplate,

and you have heaped your plate with fried chicken

and pie, shovel me covered. After you do this

there is nothing I will not do for you. I believe

in the body, not its resurrection.