Losing the Plot (Poetry)

No marble tomb for me
or neat glass-pebbled plot
where safe for all eternity
what’s left of me can rot.

I don’t want to spend my death
in some clean-cut cemetery
obliged to hold my breath
where they won’t allow a tree

to be planted at my head
so that I can feel it grow —
those thrusting roots well-fed
on what lies dead below.

Transformed into an oak
or willow shooting strong
with rain’s forgiving soak
the robin’s chipper song

will free me — cleanse the stain
hard living’s left behind
those visions that remain
lay newborn in my mind

as the sapling I’ll become
buds grateful in the Spring
to know the bee’s soft hum
the brush of each bright wing.

I’ll mark the seasons well —
the sweep of Summer past
my heart in every cell
the first leaf and the last.

My soul in each full seed
turned gold against the sky
the swooping finches feed —
our spirits fused — we fly.