The morning was at end. He awoke and never awoke again. Looking within, he was witness to his demise. Lying limp and prostrate, he was entrapped. The body was gone despite lingering thoughts.
He looked up and found no response. He looked below and was met with silence. The serenity of nothing was his sole companion.
It was some time before the body was discovered. Its stench grew potent, making vistors recoil in disgust. The usual poking and prodding was no longer invasive. These examinations appeared to him as redundant, done solely to satiate morbid curiousities. At the morgue, he was once again with nothingness.
They dressed up the cadaver for its ceremony. It was an outfit, he mused, that - if he was still kicking - wouldn't be caught dead in. The formal wear was part of the proper formalities. One by one, they took the podium to eulogize the corpse. They spoke words expected to be uttered at such an event. Tears flowed with free formality. Disagreements and conflicts were repressed under the weight of apparent grief. While they spoke about potential, promise, and of what might have been, he saw it as subterfuge. The rhetoric cloaked their collective disappointment - concealing whispers of gossip bubbling below appearances.
Soon the ceremony was over. And one by one, they passed by the pine box a final time. They closed the lid, lowered him into the ground, filled the hole, and thought nothing more of it. Lying in his resting place, he stared at the darkness - once again left to his thoughts. Alone at last. To contemplate for all time...only him and the maggots.
They gnawed away. The body erroded, until it was no more. He was returned to the earth and began anew.
He looked up and found no response. He looked below and was met with silence. The serenity of nothing was his sole companion.
It was some time before the body was discovered. Its stench grew potent, making vistors recoil in disgust. The usual poking and prodding was no longer invasive. These examinations appeared to him as redundant, done solely to satiate morbid curiousities. At the morgue, he was once again with nothingness.
They dressed up the cadaver for its ceremony. It was an outfit, he mused, that - if he was still kicking - wouldn't be caught dead in. The formal wear was part of the proper formalities. One by one, they took the podium to eulogize the corpse. They spoke words expected to be uttered at such an event. Tears flowed with free formality. Disagreements and conflicts were repressed under the weight of apparent grief. While they spoke about potential, promise, and of what might have been, he saw it as subterfuge. The rhetoric cloaked their collective disappointment - concealing whispers of gossip bubbling below appearances.
Soon the ceremony was over. And one by one, they passed by the pine box a final time. They closed the lid, lowered him into the ground, filled the hole, and thought nothing more of it. Lying in his resting place, he stared at the darkness - once again left to his thoughts. Alone at last. To contemplate for all time...only him and the maggots.
They gnawed away. The body erroded, until it was no more. He was returned to the earth and began anew.
