Releasing the Ashes

Scattering would be the wrong word,since your mother’s ashes had been packagedin a biodegradable, streamlined sleeveof handmade paper, periwinkle blue,designed to be delivered unopenedinto whatever body of waterthe loved ones choose, in our casethe open sea a mile off Marbleheadon a foggy Sunday morning in August.

The owner of the boat we’d hiredcircled the harbor before heading out,just as, you said, your father would have donehad he been alive, taking inventoryof all the sailboats on their moorings,remarking on their beauty or special features,as you did now. Then you spotted oneyou were sure was his last boat, now renamed,and an invisible passenger joined us.

As we passed the lighthouse at the harbor’s mouth,the fog was burning off, the day itselfwaking up, wiping sleep from the rocky islands,where cormorants held out their dark wingshierophantically. The buoy that marked the spotwe’d chosen—green and red, with a sea gullperched on top like a rented prop—swayed slightly,its bell ringing uncertainly, in a tonenot mournful enough for the word toll.

The engine now shut down, we rose and fellon mild swells, the water’s surface like a sheetof blue silk billowing, on which your brotherplaced the sleek parcel. It floated therefor a minute or so, slowly tipped up on its side,hesitated, then, steeped in its new element,plunged diagonally down, like a skateor ray, or some other creature all fin,diving irretrievably away.