When I’m Gone by W. D. Ehrhart

When I’m Gone

          “When I’m gone, I hope I live in the low lying fog that
          blankets the tops of the little mountains around here in
          the mornings.”
                         —Arle Bielanko

Or maybe in among the leaves of those
magnificent old trees you love so much.
Wouldn’t that be something? Just a whisper,
but enough to let you know I haven’t
really gone so far away, and I still
love you even now, even forever.

So let me be a whisper in the trees,
a gossamer wisp of fog, a twinkling
star in the heavens of your heart
to guide you through the years ahead
until we’re both where we belong,
arm in arm, out there in the cosmos.

*

W. D. Ehrhart is an ex-Marine sergeant and veteran of the American War in Vietnam. His latest book is Thank You for Your Service: Collected Poems, McFarland & Company.