"THE COCKROACH"

 i am ecdysis !
 and i shed the pelage of my flesh

my weak frame dissolves
as if the moulting of some vile insect

the clods of the earth stick together
beneath my insectile tarsi

my world becomes a swidden
and i grow a few more legs
to adapt

the human heart overflows with its own rancid discharge
and i feast upon that foulness

my appendages i now wield
as if the crook of an old wizard
but my breath is soot and my magic is garbage
and i toss like flotsam on the waves
without control

the world is one great wealth of admirable colours
but i see only grey

my feet are wet from the tears of a raped sibyl
but i do not care

leave me alone and let me hide in this stink

on and on and on i walk
in the refuse

the heavenward inclinations
of my spiritual faculty
is squashed again and again
by the sheer reality of my natural condition :
Heaven is a bug-free place i must assume...

the harlots bargain for dignity and redemption
and the children are typhoid again :
i do not have such problems, for dignity and disease
exists not in the world of creeps :

we are the disease

we never knew the dignity