Funeral Pyre

They will call you a good man,
shed praise on your cooling name
like votive sacrifices upon holy stones,
they will believe their sweet murmurs
as they torch the foot of a dry pyre,
and before the flames have grown
into full-sized masts on dead wood,
all feet will shuffle away, softly
into the pockets of a living night,
eager to save skin from the furnace
on you,
as they did when the hot was
in you.

Image Source: Joshua Robert Cook.