The Work of My Own Hands

Here I am digging a grave —
A place to lay my old self,
That body that no longer serves me.
With each layer of dirt,
The earth gets harder —
Progress gets slower.
Must I really dig six feet down?

All day, digging, my arms ache,
The shovel grows heavy in my hands.
I try to climb out for a break,
But I can’t.
I need to rest.
So I lie down, doze off to sleep.

I dream of dirt moving faster than before,
Only now it does not leave the grave
But enters it —
And it is not me that moves it.
Layer by layer the dirt finds its place,
And I find mine—underneath it.

Then I awake.
I long to climb above the dirt,
But six feet of earth press down on me—
Too much to bear.
I can’t move,
I can’t breathe.

And so I drift off back to sleep,
With no hope of rising again.
The only life coming out of this grave
Will not be me, but the grass
That feeds on what I once was.
And so I rest — not in peace,
But in the work of my own hands.