Sacred

You were immortal,
until you weren't
anymore.
I watched
a god die,
the slowest death
I’d ever seen,
and there was blood
on all our hands.

Given the chance,
I would have placed
paperbacks
bluebonnets
photographs and
packs of cigarettes
into the cracks
of your casket:
I would have woven
forget-me-not’s and
lilies-of-the-valley
into your hair,
and dressed your body
in rose and iris
daisy-chains.

But they stopped me
at the gate
on the day you met
the ground:
you were too
sacred.