POEM - PARADISE

BODY

This is what happened

the dead were settling in under their mud roof

and something was shuffling overhead

it was a badger treading on the thin partition

bewildered were the dead
going about their days and nights in the dark

putting their feet down carefully and finding themselves floating
but that badger

still with the simple heavy box of his body needing to be lifted
was shuffling away alive

hard at work
with the living shovel of himself
into the lane he dropped
         not once looking up

and missed the sight of his own corpse falling like a suitcase towards him

with the grin like an opened zip
         (as I found it this morning)

and went on running with that bindweed will of his

went on running along the hedge and into the earth again
trembling

as if in a broken jug for one backwards moment

               water might keep its shape

- Alice Oswald