Birthday Poem

Every year, I write a little poem on my birthday. It's not perfect and it's never finished. This is what I wrote this year:


Tomorrow is my birthday
I feel ants sharpen their teeh
readying to peel back my rind.

It'll be easy for the ants and the beetles
to find me -- the grave, handdug
is near the wasp's nest under my favorite fig tree.

Three hours of pulling earth away 
from itself, and my fingernails clogged-- I can smell
chicken manure from last year's harvest.