Qing Ming

-In Memory of Jay

On a bright clear spring day

We went to visit your new grave.

Candles lit, fruit and cakes offered.

Yellow spider web chrysanthemum

Decorated your newly erected monument.

Ph.D, mathematician, father, husband

Friend, forever carved in stone.

New grass grew on the spot

Where you lay,

Soft and tender to the touch

Fuzzy hair

On an infant's head.

The old man in the cemetery told us

Not to leave anything unnatural,

For deer and rabbits

Were friendly neighbors

Sharing the offerings.

We led the children

Ketou to you.

Your elders stood solemnly watching,

Too old to bend.

Eyes misty, we forced a smile

For the camera

To catch the moment

For your parents to see.

Were you there in the air

Sharing this moment with us

Watching the children play?

Don't think you would mind

Children enriching the soil

In the nearby bush.

They said you could smell

The scented candle and the flavor

Of sacrifice. Yet they

Did not want us to say

Good-bye, for fear

You would follow us home

And become a wandering soul.