my body is embalmed for burial
as my husband weeps, sings hymns
and begs that i return to him
is there allowance for this?
to be useful to my mourning lover:
in our kitchen
as asparagus
in his lab
as apparatus
in the aether
as apparition
as apologetic ghost
I’m sorry my beloved
i truly meant to stay
‘nobody knows the aftermath’,
kalwar said
the malice of death, its wrath
unrelenting and sparing none
nobody can predict the end,
nobody knows that tears fall
in the afterlife except us: the
dead the lost the after after
after what? there is nothing
beyond our life together,
a chorus we had just begun
my love, even in death i grieve
Nkateko Masinga is a poet and 2019 Fellow at the Ebedi International Writers’ Residency.