by Siddiq Islam

To lie in the dirt and to slowly decay!
A prospect more tempting than all other things.
The righteous career of corroding away,
A subject of earthworms, the Underground Kings.

I see your grand temples, with so much potential
To topple and crumble to dust when they fall,
But hanker for something more experiential –
I, too, should diffuse into nothing at all.

If only! To witness my molecules spread,
Enjoy so entirely my final reward,
My great vindication before I am dead,
From clay to be born and to clay be restored.

I’d finally be free from the chore of emotion,
The burdens of feeling, decision and sense.
I’d bypass the bother of daily commotion,
The curse of cognition, and experience.

I suffer the same as the last sorry metrist
Whose words washed you over like wet seaside stones
But his nor my shame shall continue to exist
Once sweet, soft abrasion has rescued our bones.

So, Intangible Boundary who upholds my oneness,
Why stop me indulging the world’s natural way?
Afford me the virtue to sate each starved fungus,
To lie in the dirt and to slowly decay.