buried.


         
        I. - Archaeologist        


Digging.  And digging.


I  dig to escape the heat
of a burning relentless sun

I find broken shards
of useless pretty things
I unearth crypts filled
with the only people I really know,
all dead a thousand years and more,
who spoke tongues as equally forgotten.


I dig under a cold moonlight
into the darkening soil

I find scratched sherds
with pointless scores & tallies
I open tombs filled
with tablets & scrolls reliving tales
of battles, wars, slain kin & lost glories,
written in languages dead to all but myself.


          
         II. - Grave Digger          


Digging.  And digging.


All that I find
I keep close to me.

I claim it all as my own;
these coffins and sarcophagi
these cracked tessellated walls
these disintegrating parchments
and why not - for it was I
who placed them here.


All that I find
I keep myself close to

I claim it to be myself;
my bitter treasures
my poison relics
my guarded trove of dust
all of which I pore over
avidly devouring


           
          III. - Grave Robber            


I crawl between the shattered columns
deep inside my tomb gasping, choking, wheezing
on thousand-year old air and fatal kisses
from these dessicated corpses around me

Its so quiet here.
The scrabblings & the scrapings
have all finally ceased as well.

With an uncomprehending gaze
the darkness reaches out, embraces me.

From somewhere, a whisper
Who was that
saying,
sometimes
the past is overly cherished