My Grave

It’s dark down in this box in this hole.
Can’t seem to get enough light or air.
But I don’t need either, I am dead. Dead to me,
to my friends, to the world. I do wonder what they
are saying about me, I really don’t want to know.
Maybe I was helpful. Maybe I had a temper.

I guess I am supposed to ask
forgiveness of all those I have offended, my bones
will have become fossils before I reach the end of that list.
So I will make a blanket statement: I am sorry to all those
I have transgressed. That might keep me out of Hell
but I had so many good intentions, I am afraid my road
is already paved.

It’s quiet down here and I like that,
Time to listen to the worms converting clay into good soil,
listen to the 17 year cicadas grow in their exoskeletons.
I wonder if my soul will rise from this dead body to float
among the stars. Perhaps then I will live again to hear wind
in the trees, birds calling form their perch.