First Edit: Wannabe/Death of a Poet

[Richard]

Death of a Poet


Is it normal to fantasize
about an award named for me?
To imagine myself
beneath the weight of soil,
my lipless teeth trying to smile,
my rotted brain telling the worms,
with each bite they take,
of a legacy summed up in a title?
My eye sockets might even feel useful again.

But like those dying, who open
their eyes one last time,
I know there is no man-made
immortality-  all words are but gasps
lost in the night.

Original:
Wannabe

I fantasize,
like a teenager dreams about sex,
that they'll name an award after me.
I imagine myself
beneath the weight of soil,
my lipless teeth trying to smile.
I imagine my rotted brain tells the worms
with each bite they take.
I imagine my eye sockets feel useful again,
their legacy summed up in a name.
I then pretend
to forget the elegies, the dirges,
they require too much effort
like life.

But I know,
like an old man who closes his eyes for the last time,
there is no man-made immortality:
all names are eventually lost
like a dying breath in the night.