ONE THOUSAND WORDS ON A TOMBSTONE
Here lies Delores Ray who saw, one day,
the Blue Hag through a spyglass while watching for birds
in the back meadow of the Ray home.
Beloved daughter who asked, always, to borrow her father’s glass,
and who handled the device with meticulous care, adoration, it seemed,
as if the glass were not only an assistance for her own eyes
but a way by which to be with the birds,
to actually be with them, in the sky, to fly.
Beloved daughter who asked
each day upon waking if it was Saturday,
the day on which she’d step into her rain boots,
cradle her notebook and pen under one arm,
ask Father for the use of his glass,
and tramp out the home’s back door,
crossing the deck and down the decks stairs,
to the marsh before the meadow,
the swamp through which she had to pass
before reaching the meadow better known as Ray Field.
Beloved sister who asked her younger sister Priscilla Ray
to join her the day she, Delores,
saw the Blue Hag through Father’s fine glass.
Delores and Priscilla in matching boots,
the muck nearly to their knees,
as Priscilla stopped to catch a frog
and Delores said, that very day,
Never mind with toads today, sister!
There are extraordinary things in the sky!
Delores Ray, beloved granddaughter, Grandma Ruth’s favorite
as Ruth introduced the girl to the wonders of nature,
life in the marsh, life in the meadow,
and gave Delores her first book on birds.
Beloved aunt to baby Ralph
who cried suddenly within the Ray home,
cried and would not be consoled,
not by his mother January nor his father Nathaniel
to whom Delores was indeed also a beloved sister.
Beloved neighbor, spotted by the Banner Clan,
jaunting into the meadow with her sister Priscilla,
the glass in Delores’s hand, always in Delores’s hand.
The neighbor June Banner closing the drapes
after witnessing the girls arrival in the meadow.
June Banner who later said she felt a storm coming
but wrote in her journal she was afraid of the sky that day,
the very day, claimed she saw a fissure above,
said the sky was held together by ribbon in a steel boned corset.
Said she feared it coming undone.
Beloved neighbor to Douglas Banner, too,
who watched from his bedroom window the sisters
even as his mother June turned from the sight
of the two young girls playing in the tall grass,
one of them with a spyglass to her eye, trained on the sky.
Beloved sister of she, Priscilla,
who looked up just in time to see a shiver ripple down Delores’s body,
she, Priscilla, who looked up to the sky to see a single bluebird
or, as she described to Doctor Mayfair,
A flying thing coated in blue fur.
Delores Ray, beloved neighbor of that same Douglass Banner
whose hair went white from the sight of the same bird in the sky.
Beloved daughter of Harrison Ray
who saw first Priscilla running too quick through the marsh, screaming,
Delores! Delores! Delores saw something rotten in the sky!
It wasn’t until the younger of the two sisters fell
in that same muck that Harrison saw Delores, on that day,
walking steady behind, far behind, her hair hanging over her face,
obscuring whatever it was she tried to remove from her face.
Walking like blind.
Beloved daughter of Nell Ray
who ran past Harrison and assisted Priscilla
to standing before rushing to her eldest daughter
(no rain boots for Nell, muck to her naked knees)
and there saw what her husband could not
from the back porch of the Ray home,
saw that Delores’s dark hair obscured new eyes,
navy eyes, orbs of furred blue, witch’s eyes,
punishment for having seen a witch in the sky.
Here lies Delores Ray who, on that day,
saw the Blue Hag split the ribbon of the boned corset,
saw more of her than anybody is allowed to see.
Beloved master to Barley, hunting dog,
who loved dear Delores most of all
but who would not watch birds with her,
refused to ever cross the muck to the meadow.
Beloved neighbor of Sammy Banner who,
having seen her brother turn white,
rushed to the Ray home to seek help,
arriving rather to discover damnation in the kitchen
as Delores Ray swiped at her own eyes,
attempting to pluck the blue fur from her sockets,
succeeding enough to send tiny blue feathers to the kitchen floor.
Beloved sister of Nathaniel Ray
who couldn’t quiet baby Ralph and so left said duty to January
before taking a musket from the pantry
and setting off to kill the Blue Hag in the sky.
Here lies Delores Ray who spoke in the kitchen,
as all other but Nathaniel listened,
as she said these words: She looks back.
Beloved daughter of Harrison and Nell,
parents who carried Delores to Doctor Mayfair,
showed him the furred eyes, demanded he help.
Beloved member of the congregation of Father Lawrence Cantor
who saw Delores when Mayfair said no more,
there would be eyes no more, only blue.
Father Lawrence who took the girl, here lying,
to the foot of Christ and asked the savior for a miracle,
but fled said church as Christ looked down upon him
with furred eyes of his own.
Beloved daughter, sister, granddaughter,
neighbor, master, friend to all,
Evidenced by the funeral line who attended the ceremony,
who were asked not to look her in the eye,
for Aaron Buck could not close them,
all who respected these wishes, this command,
by blindfolding themselves, one by one,
touching the side of the casket,
weeping into black fabric upon their faces.
Here lies Delores Ray,
who saw the Blue Hag in the sky that day.
And so it is known that one ought not to look into the sky,
not when the color blue is nearby,
for a witch, too, has eyes.
Blue eyes. The color of color’s ending.
Chiseled by Aaron Buck, 2 August, 1784