Things in my office, vacant of life, wait--
the earthbrown carpet for the vacuum,
paper for a vacancy in a file,
a clock for someone to need the time
its crystalline cycling the only movement
in this small dead world
since the poisons entered.
Crickets, silverfish, psocids lie about
in corners, under papers, behind books.
I shall find their skeletons when I return--
brittle, dust-light, empty, their dry insect odor
masked by a lingering poison perfume.
I shall check the clock; I shall wonder
how much time is left.
My bones weigh more than an insect's.
My flesh hangs heavily upon them.
I wonder, will enough of me still be left
to interest these insects' kin
when they begin
their long vacation
from us
and even our poisons
decay?
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