He always fretted as a tiny boy About what would happen if people called Or 'something happened' while he was in bed. At school he worried about the million, Inconsequential things that children fear. He was anxious, as a youth, for the Earth, Its peoples, their futures (and his own) and About how he looked and what people thought of Him and of his clothes and his taste in bands. As he aged he worried about his boss, The bank account and the kids, the mortgage And his thinning hair and mouldering car And then about his pension and his hips And his back and teeth and the kids again Until he became uneasy about His funeral costs and about his death. He feared a painful ending and what would, Or would not, come thereafter. Agonies Of indecision racked him concerning Deathbed confession or conversion to Another faith, just in case he had been Mistaken, misled, since a tiny boy Worried about what would happen when he Was not there and was at his rest above. Centuries later, the dust that had been The boy and the man brooded quietly And worried silently about where it Would be blown next and what the people there Would think of it when it settled on them. |