Poem – You pick away at the Earth… (By Simon Perchik)

You pick away at the Earth

as if your grave was filled

with the wait for flowers :one foot

already pleased, the other

still wrapped in dirt

weighed down stone by stone

the way fruit is ripened

keyed up and seaworthy, is lowered

into a wooden box

that never leaves shore

just the loading and unloading

though step by step

you overflow from a single rock

broken into twigs

coming by for your mouth

–you want to walk out, trade

make a deal tit for tat

the dry grass that has no blossoms yet.