Page:The Recluse by W Paul Cook.djvu/81



And I am dead. Six feet deep I lie, And I am dead. I can not move an eye; I can not move a thigh; I can not even sigh, For I am dead. Set, fixed, immovable my head; Set, fixed, immovable my bed; Set, fixed, immovable myself, now wed To coffin, earth, the dead. All the rottenness, I dread; All the flesh on which fat worms have fed; All the slime and mould that slowly spread About me, who am dead. Nevermore shall I hear sound In my tomb beneath the ground, In my grave beneath my mound. Six feet deep my corpse lies, drowned In dissolution’s rot. Around, Eternal night, and earth damp, black, and cold That presses on my grave and me, all rolled In my own decomposition. Thick, white worms have lolled Their dripping tongues from my soft flesh that, old And spoiling, lured them. But I could not squirm When I felt through me spread the germ Of worm that multiplied on worm Until my dead flesh stirred. I only lay, Sick, still, and weary, while they ate their way; I only sighed to feel them play And wriggle through my gray Corruption. Six feet deep I lie in my last sleep; Six feet deep. I feel the worms that creep, creep, creep, I feel the worms that leap In ecstacy to reap The harvest, and to revel deep In dark liquescence. Mocking maggots peep At me and slyly chuckle while they keep Their festful riot in my melting heap.

I now have ceased to bloat; Worms now have ceased to gloat, Or in my dead flesh foul to float, Forevermore. Stained is the coffin floor