When that my body lies all rotten
That my life’s flame be not forgotten,
Erect a box above my grave,
And scraps I wrote on therein save.

Then one like me, who comes to pass
Across the graveyard’s soft green grass,
Who idly meditates the stones
Of scores, beyond their names unknown,
Will come to where my body’s buried
And find my little life’s library,

And learn how one once lived and saw
The world around him, filled with awe,
And how one loved, and how one cared
For those who with him life’s dance shared,
And how one thought all kinds of things
And felt the aches that envy brings,
And how one wrestled long with Christ
And trusted in His sacrifice,
And how one dreamt of fears and hopes
And worlds beyond this mortal scope…

God grant that he’ll be none the worse
For reading of my books of verse.