Rest In Peace or Get Up and Go
for Ned L. Siegel

I need to change my posture sometimes
without end sitting and writing,
sitting and reading

must get on the bus, must get up and go,
must get up and move

in bed occasionally, must have intercourse
must sit at a table, dinner and discourse

must get on a flight, must travel to new lands

though I am so lazy, must go on the beach
must walk in the sand, swim in the sea

all the strokes I learned in swimming classes
at Memphis State to try out

how lazy and timid I am these days, to climb trees
I was fearless in my youth
up a dilly tree, up a guinep tree, up a coconut tree

timid me, sit and write, sit and read
unlike a soldier, off to war
crawling and firing, killing and dying

or flying over, dropping bombs
upon cockroaches and ants and rats and people

maybe I should bungee jump or roller coaster ride
or roller skate or fall in love

I've lost my appetite, my appreciation for life

once I used to be young, I was in love once,
a white girl and I, in racist Memphis
where M. L. King was killed

like Castro or Che,
I regret not ever having started a revolution
regret not ever having engaged in guerrilla warfare

sitting and writing, sitting and reading

Hemingway stood when he wrote
stood and wrote, stood and typed
Old Man and the Sea in the Finca Vigia

not only did he read and write
he went fishing, went to bull fights
went hunting in Africa, and he went to war

I need to change my posture
how weary I am of sitting and writing,
sitting and reading

I have a dilly tree to climb, a yard to clean
my whole big house to make immaculate

other muscles to activate, other things to add
to eating and sleeping, defecating and reading,

writing and worrying
about where the next several hundred dollars
will come from

how I love when it rains, how it relaxes me,
comforts me

when I'm dead, I wonder, how will it feel,
how will it be, in a grave asleep,
arms across my chest, big smile on my face


© Obediah Michael Smith, 2008
1:18 p.m. 05.07.08