Encumbered, we struggled with death,
the weight of gore ungainly, unclean,
gravity-bound, of cruciate uncrossed,
that we lowered and swaddled in cloth,
now soiled of blood and sweat; then
stumbling grief, labored and stubbed,
the way to the cave, stooped small at
the entrance, and dark, and one of us
must back in first, must carry not push,
or one last indignity we would inflict …
