I have no doubt that once you were much admired.

A truly dainty lady you must have been ;
these are no peasant’s bones; but now
imagination quails before the task
of clothing this in flesh.

Some few dry facts are there:
female, Caucasian ;
nationality :probably French.
The rest is mostly insignificant
(for example, six teeth lost from the lower mandible,
two before death)

But what you are now is nothing more
than a student exercise in reconstruction.
What once was round and warm now shows
only cold and angled planes of light,
the quintessential pattern of abstraction

From this point , speculation .

Your preferences
are not to be consulted in the matter.

I can only wonder , did you feel
death’s fingers probe into the shrinking flesh ?
Did you die fevered , chilled , smiling or in tears?
Did you die shriven ?
And when they buried you with bell and benediction
did they imagine you would come to this ?

Enough .
I regret that I can offer you no more
than this within me - a memento mori.