I ask you to picture something dead

to picture graves, as desiccation leaves
a web of sprawling cracks on blackened flesh
with splitting seams. see soft white mold enmesh
a cavity collapsing. it bloats and heaves

and maggots flow like brackish water drops.
A stark procession over purple skin,
to count them now like sheep, as they dive in
among the mushrooms blooming in a copse.

a vibrant, vital, scene unfolds before
you, death begets this lovely garden bloom.
the mottled flesh embraced by gentle spore.

as these unsightly images exhume
this teeming growth, you now cannot ignore
how many lives are lived within this gloom.