He knelt for the mushrooms where the oldest graves had settled, his basket catching on the grass. His father had taught him to turn each cap and look beneath. Sixty years, and still that hand upon his wrist.
Under his knees, pale threads went branching through the earth, among the roots of beech and yew, entering their small exchanges with the dark. Someday they would find him. He tried to imagine being found so patiently, being entered without pain; the long work of keeping himself together quietly relieved.
He rested by the family stone. Rain had deepened certain letters of his name and almost taken others. The name was older than anyone buried here. It had crossed a sea in someone’s frightened mouth, been misheard, written down, bestowed upon a child. Before he knew what names were, it was his. His mother had called it through a doorway, and he had turned.
Even now, alone, the words with which he thought of death had come from other people. They ran through him like the white filaments beneath the grass: branching through the places where he supposed himself entire. Someone long dead had given him the word beneath. Someone had first said home of a place he would never see.
He brushed the soil from one small cap. There was room in the basket for a few more.
When he stood, he used the stone to steady himself. For a moment his warm hand covered the name.