Hi... I saw your post... What a wonderful and thoughtful gift. I wrote something to try to help you out.. While Visitng Bethlehem.... What Did I See .. But A Tiny Ornament To Hang From Your Tree... A CROSS.... Made Of Olive Wood & Twine.... With A Significance That Is So Devine.. So Each Year When You... Hang This Cross On Your Tree... May You Think Of Our Lord, and Remember Me.... Hope this was helpful...Good Luck jane

Maybe Set them up in a line and in the last a surprise you'll find.

So many poets; there are a number of male poets who wrote of death. Walt Whitman, Robert Frost, Carlos Williams, e.e. cummings, Dylan Thomas (Do not go gently into that good night). Without knowing the people involved here, I would throw out this touching end to a long poem: [Yet when we meet we seem in silence to say, Pretending serene forgetfulness of our youth, "Do you remember but then why should you remember! Do you remember a certain day, Or evening rather, spring evening long ago, We talked of death, and love, and time, and truth, And said such wise things, things that amused us so How foolish we were, who thought ourselves so wise!" And then we laugh, with shadows in our eyes.] --Conrad Aiken, Nocturne of Remembered Spring. or this: [The world is too much with us ; late and soon, Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers : Little we see in Nature that is ours ; We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon ! This Sea that bares her bosom to the moon ; The winds that will be howling at all hours, And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers ; For this, for everything, we are out of tune ; It moves us not.  Great God ! IÂd rather be A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn ; So might I, standing on this pleasant lea, Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn ; Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea ; Or hear old Triton blow his wreathèd horn.] --William Wordsworth Or, [Epitaph by Sir Walter Ralegh Even such is Time, which takes in trust Our youth, our joys, and all we have, And pays us but with age and dust; Who in the dark and silent grave, When we have wandered all our ways, Shuts up the story of our days: And from which earth, and grave, and dust, The Lord shall raise me up, I trust.] There's a popular one that ends "...Twas Heaven Here with You." that I can't find. Here's a place to start a search. Here is a link that might be useful: Poets' Graves

How about this: Their leaves have fallen with the setting suns, We will soon say goodbye to all our summer fun, But out in the garden still standing tall, There are Autumn flowers still fighting fall, With their beautiful colors, from yellows to reds, Scattered all across all my flower beds, Time will get them too, as the cold winter nears, But I will enjoy my Autumn flowers, while they are still here. I don't know if that is what you are looking for, but I wrote it. Penny