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Memento Mori

Plague of old, it threatens me.

Accounts I keep locked in my crypt
of stale garments stuck to me, while
rich sepulchres motor by.

I fear I shall again be forced
to walk among the filth that roam
the avenues where I will engage 
in that accursed profession,
 when I will be spat upon
--toiling for less than twenty.

When my throat is dry and
there is no place to bathe,
I'll dance the dance of the condemned:

The subtropic trauma march
with heavy feet, no rest,
becoming like the rest
of those mobile mummies
--Slowly ripening, as they too,
keep to in like fashion.

Eyes flicker in the night
as we scurry to dine and shop
at our favorite half-star spot:
That big green sentinel that sits there,

the only thing that renders no judgement 

as we rummage through it.

We shrug, picking through the worst,

accepting what we can.
Then we drag onto other places
--heads low, a few with wailing babies.

Some of us will live tonight;
the rest, who is to say?
One thing is for certain:
No matter what our bodies endure,
nor how iron our will;
if mercy does not find us, then
Whomever is still breathing

will, by the streets, be swallowed whole.

Fran Hinkle
5/13/19   
Revised 5/13/19