Scrape, Scrape, Scrape Poem by Francis Santaquilani

The ashes that were his photos
Have long since disintegrated.
Somehere up north
He's encased in frozen soil dusted with snow.
A cold wind howls over him now.
Over his numbered grave.
His name never escapes my lips anymore.
We no longer share the same surname.

The days are good now.
Games in the sun,
Magnolia trees for shade.
The children play and laugh
Past their bedtime.
Every now and then, though
When it's past my bedtime,
And the trains aren't running, and
The mockingbirds have finally settled down,
I freeze, then burn and
Then ache to take the sharpest,
The most precise blade,
Of the hardest metal I can find and
Scrape, srape, scrape every trace of him
From my marrow.