The Unwrapped Mummy

THE UNWRAPPED MUMMY


The unwrapped mummy
Appeared again, still nude.

The waist chain, the ankle bracelets
Were missing.

She had blue faience eye shadows,
The same blue as the sacred hippo.

This time she was Carol Octnova,
Who was still alive and a novelist.

She had written sixty four novels
About a swamp goddess in the underwater Atlantis.

I gazed at her exciting pale red hair,
Her pale emerald eyes,

What are you doing here,
You are still alive.

She replied, I’m not here.

You’re not here.

No, I am not here.
I am on vacation at Sanibel Island

With my lawyer husband
And our six red-headed children.

I keep gazing at her,
Gazing at her nudity.

I wished she would go away.
It is so tranquil here among the dead.

She would not go away.
She just stood there.

I walked around her,
Observing her body

From different positions
Of perspective.

This was strange since
I had no eyes, had no brain.

I still wished she would go away,
For her presence,

So supremely exalting,
So life-enhancing,

Reminded me
Of how much I had wasted my life.

This is the first time
I had ever had

A vital relationship with the other.
It never happened

When I was one
Of the living death on earth.

Living is such a waste.
There are too many personae in us.

I kept walking around her
And gazing.

She was pure splendor,
But this splendor was

Tarnished, degraded,

Polluted by popular

And prevalent opinion
Of living dead on our earth.

The living dead with their values,
Beliefs destroy

All life exaltations,
All life enhancement.

I asked her, Do you remember me,
Recognize me now that I am dead.
You know, we were once ardent lovers,
Recall Locarno, Montepulciano, Orvieto.

She answered, I don’t know who
You are. How can I remember you
No, I don’t recognize you.
I was never in Locarno,
Montepulciano, Orvieto.

All I see is a skeleton
Standing upright.


Duane Locke

Posted over on Ditch Poetry