number twelve

after life sketch.

it's not even safe underground.
i wonder if you sleep better in colder dirt,

the earthworms like cold pickled jellyfish
and you a stiff and stale bread pudding.

an unappetizing mix, but is death
anyone's idea of dessert? maybe for

the very aged, crumbling blue cheese that can't
fight its own funk, slowly breaking down

the plastic container keeping its remains
fresh (as inconsistent as ever,

why do we bother preserving bodies
when we're only going to wish them

a happy decomposition) and do they
write it well, full of beetles and maggots maybe

the beautiful pearl of bone surviving for
its time to shine (in the dull glow of darkness)

i wonder if it's hard to break down the coffin door?
survive even the finale and perhaps that bit of mahogany

looks easy. though what if yours are
lazy bones, and it takes centuries to coax them to the fight,

come on come on come on, just one swift kick
and six feet of dust and you're off, dandy bones,

shaking off and reassembling your humanoid glory
(aren't skeletons strangely like robots?) from the very core

of the thing to the very outskirts of town, wandering bones,
tired old bones, crickety bones, rocking chair porch bones,

sweetly scrubbing till they shimmer, empty eye sockets
glaring, down to town hall for a good old time, dancing bones

even down below there's work to be done, that work
fire makes look so easy, under perfect conditions,

got to get ourselves back down to where we started from,
a pile of ambitionless ash, not even gasping for breath, not even in pain.