Man Vs. Nature

The half-moon tips my
rotten carcass

over with a stick and
mumbles her way

back home. Stars

groan with approval.
The bootless dead toss

small coins.
Rabbits twitch pinkly

in their holes. Minerals

crust around my open
mouth and harden

along my palate's fluted
vault.

Owls inspect the edges
of it; cats touch

the moon with their whiskers.

Small fists of
it unknot in my armpit.

No one does anything
about it beneath

the pagan
horns of the naked trees.

Copyright © 2010 Michael Derrick Hudson All rights reserved
from The Greensboro Review
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission