Once, when my toes
were still more familiar
with damp soil
than dry soles,
and my dandelion hair
puffed, perpetually
unbrushed,
I worried that worms
were what ate away
at grandparents’ brains,
in an unseen
tunneling rot.
A rot not so unlike
the compost heap
behind our old shed-
a shed that hummed
with wasp swarm,
a heap that reeked
like death.
Then, I thought those
same worms ate away
at their core,
wriggling through
scrap memory, until
wrinkled folks forgot
everything-
like how to breathe,
how to see,
and finally,
how to be.
Until what was,
becomes
no more.
pm poetry 