Defiance (Lent Poems 32)

If there is yet hope for this flower

(drying, dying, disconnected from its source),

then take it,

attach it once more to

the stem from which it fell.

Let decaying petals be fresh once again.

Give water, give sunlight.

Photo-synthesise: give life.

If there is yet life in this body

(I cling to that hope) –

then take it, blast it, lift it into your light:

then it will not atrophy, die.

Defy the laws that work on

bodies and on soil, the cycles

that drag all flesh to the ground.

Defy them now.

If there is yet breath beyond

the walls of this tomb (I see

a body moving through a gap

by the stone), then roll away

the mammoth rock between

that life and the sun’s light.

Let air re-enter that body’s tombs;

let graves and passageways respire.

Defy the law that says: all flesh is grass.

Let no grass grow over this tomb.

Published by Matthew Pullar