I burdened the world enough, alive.
In death, let me not be impervious,
indigestible, not another container
locked, sealed, and stacked
Beneath an upright stone.
Burn me then to fertilizing ash? Mingle me
Then with my home ground or the restless sea,
throw me to the winds? Fit metaphor
for life’s vanishing, except only:
my childish horror of the flames.
So I choose to be planted unpreserved,
wound in a shroud or boxed in pine or
packed in a willow casket, returned to earth.
I think, at last, not the sanctity of the shroud,
and plain pine boards too solid and too raw.
But willow, yes: bury me in wicker.
A roomy picnic basket, and me the meal,
a loose weave to let the rain soak through,
open to the roots and the hungry worms.
Yes: a feast and then a long sleep, out of doors.